Bali has taken the top spot in a list of destinations to avoid exaggerated claims that tourism has eroded its natural beauty.
Fodors magazines placed the idyllic Indonesian island on its 2025 ‘Banned List’ alongside 15 other destinations including Barcelona, Venice, Koh Samui and Mount Everest.
The travel site’s annual list highlights tourist destinations deemed “suffering from unsustainable popularity.”
The editors said the natural environment and the tourism industry are intertwined in the tropical enclave and that the large number of visitors threatens to degrade both.
“Rapid and unbridled development driven by overtourism is encroaching on Bali’s natural habitats, eroding its environmental and cultural heritage and creating a ‘plastic apocalypse,'” Fodors said.
“Once pristine beaches such as Kuta and Seminyak are now buried under piles of rubbish, and local waste management systems are struggling to keep up.”
The Central Statistics Office of Bali province noted that some 3.5 million foreigners had already visited the island in the first seven months of 2024.
The magazine said the strong number of tourists after the pandemic intensified “tension on the island.”
Bali’s natural serenity is threatened by a wave of detractors brought by international tourism, magazine warns
Local media suggested that the south-central part of the island suffered the most, with a high concentration of resorts, traffic, development and waste and water management issues plaguing the area.
Bali Tourism Board president Ida Bagus Agung Partha Adnyana said the problem was not the total number of visitors.
“The problem is not the number of tourists in general, but the concentration of tourism in certain areas, especially in southern Bali,” he told the Bali Sun.
‘This means that other areas of Bali that are truly rich in culture and natural beauty do not receive the same attention, either from tourists or tourism managers.
“Bali does not deserve to be considered a destination to avoid in 2025 because the problem we face has more to do with the concentration of tourism in southern Bali, not overtourism as a whole.”
Indonesian Hotel Association (PHRI) vice president I Gusti Ngurah Rai Suryawijaya said Bali needs to be re-evaluated.
“This is a warning to Bali itself: Bali must stop being tired of preserving its natural culture and environment,” he said.
The magazine clarified that certain destinations had not earned their place because they were disappointing.
Instead, they were selected for facing a series of existential risks posed by international tourism.
“These places are popular for good reason: they are impressive, intriguing, and culturally significant,” this list makes clear.
“However, some of these highly sought-after tourist spots are collapsing under the weight of their own prominence.”
Other destinations considered to have been negatively affected by tourism include Agrigento in Sicily, the British Virgin Islands, Kerala in India, Kyoto and Tokyo in Japan, and Oaxaca in Mexico.
