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Borneo island is located at southeast of the Malay Peninsula and southwest of the Philippines. It is divided into four political regions; Kalimantan belongs to Indonesia, Sabah and Sarawak are part of Malaysia, and a remaining region comprises Brunei Darussalam (PBS, 1998). Cross border areas between three countries can contribute to economic development especially tourism industries across the borders. Borneo is the third largest island in the world primarily mountainous with dense areas of rain forest covering an area of roughly 287,000 square miles.
Borneo Island is niche area with enormous potential ranging from high-level interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary research to multi diversities of eco-tourism attractiveness. The tourism industry has experienced a steady growth over the decades and become one of the fastest growing economic sectors in the world (UNWTO, 2015). In fact, 2017 was another record year for the travel industry with international tourist numbers increasing by 6.8 per cent globally, the highest rate since the 2009 global economic crisis and well above UNWTO’s long-term forecast of 3.8 percent per year in 2010-2020.
There are problems with the current tourism practices in the Borneo without CBT that make Borneo becomes less attractive spot to visit. Those problems are complexities arrangement to move from one country to another, few packages tourism for the whole Borneo tourism program making it costly, without CBT the tourism in Borneo is inefficient and less attractive. The aim of the study is to portray current tourism’s landscape for each country within Borneo Island then examine the potentials for Brunei-CBT (BCBT) initiative as the gateway for its development. Since there is no such CBT’s studies for in the Borneo, this study will contribute to the body of knowledge as well as potentially applicable and practicable in the future of Brunei-CBT in Borneo. The research focuses on the potentials and challenges associated with Brunei-CBT initiatives in the Borneo’s border areas.
Cross Border Tourism (CBT)
Tourism industries can directly affect much to the country development economically and socially development. Some of the impacts are opening it up for business, trade and capital investment, creating jobs and entrepreneurialism for the workforce and protecting heritage and cultural values (Batala et al., 2017). It generated US$7.6 trillion (10% of global GDP) and 277 million jobs (WTTC, 201). There are many advantages related to joint CBT collaborations. These include joint infrastructural developments, strengthened regional identity and marketing, improved regional economy, and catalyst for innovation and knowledge transfer (Timothy et al., 2014; Weidenfeld, 2013).
Figure 1. Borneo Island (Source: Encyclopedia Britanica)
According to Newman et al. (1998), there are 273 species and 20 subspecies of Dipterocarpaceae in this area. FAO (1981) described Borneo as an island covered by a continuous carpet of evergreen rain forest dissected by swirling brown rivers. The climate is humid, with a rainfall varying between 2000 and 4000 mm/year. Given the abundance of rainfall, it makes sense that Borneo's flora is among the most diverse in the world. Borneo has nearly 11,000 species of flowering plants, about a third of which are indigenous. Cross-border tourism development projects often encounter challenges of different character (Skäremo, 2016). These challenges tend to be associated with difficulties to establish cohesiveness due to different social, cultural, economic, political, and organizational systems in two or more adjacent countries (Timothy & Tosun, 2003; Blasco et al., 2014; Prokkola et al., 2015).
In order to make CBT possible, there are some criteria for entering collaborating arrangements as proposed by Lynch (2011) as shown at Figure 2. Firstly, the competitive attainment of strategic objectives leading to synergy resulting from a combination of various resources. Instead of offering a single country package, it will be more interesting and marketable for potential tourists when they can visits three different countries with a single visa or a single tourism packages for all visits. In addition, the reduction of risk together with an increase in benefits means improving safety and removing barriers to support cross border tourism. Collaboration to create peace, safety and security across region will increase benefits for tourism in Borneo. Safety and security are the primary criteria for the selection of a tourism industry. Some barriers for CBT are complicated administration for people, goods, and transport movement across the border. It requires a hassle free administration.
Figure 2. Criteria for Collaborative Arrangements