Wales’ tourism huge so don’t talk twaddle

KARL-JAMES Langford does the Welsh tourism industry a great disservice with his letter (August 17).

As the owner of Cardigan Island Coastal Farm Park, a tourist attraction at Gwbert, Cardigan, I can assure him that our visitors do not drop litter everywhere, as he asserts.

The vast majority, from England, Wales and all over the world, are nice people who are very responsible and do not leave a mess.

Is the litter apparent in parts of south Wales dropped by English or other tourists or by a minority of local people, I wonder?

In popular remote tourism locations, local authorities could sometimes help themselves and Wales by supplying more numerous, far bigger, rubbish receptacles.

Mr Langford then says that “tourism for Cymru generates around 6% of our income.”

That’s total nonsense over most of Wales.

The two main wealth-creating industries over 80% of Wales are agriculture and tourism and many Welsh farmers, like myself, have long diversified into tourism ventures to bring in extra income and create jobs.

A truly vast number of Welsh people, all over Wales, are dependent on the spin-off from tourism.

They include shops, pubs, restaurants, garages, plus the large public sector, which cannot exist without the private sector to create the wealth for “UK Ltd” in the first place.

Without tourism, country pubs, shops and garages etc would not be in existence for locals!

Besides, if tourism did only create a mere 6% income, why would he want to reduce it?

How can anyone possibly curtail tourism from England when there are 57 million living there, next door to a nation of three million?

Has he not heard of simple osmosis?

Besides, who and what is a “tourist” exactly, in Karl Langford’s book? An English person from Chester visiting Llangollen is travelling less than a Llanelli lady shopping in Cardiff. Both are “tourists”. Try stopping either!

Lyn Jenkins Cardigan Island Coastal Farm Park Gwbert, Cardigan