RESEARCH NOTE: Malacca River as a new Malacca’s tourist attraction: A critical review

As a lucrative economic contributor countries such as Malaysia promote their tourism industry by developing new tourist destinations and attractions. This study reviews the Malacca River as a new environmental tourist attraction in historic Malacca. Malacca River’s original main function was to serve as a source of water for human and animal consumption, agricultural activities, transport, and employment opportunities. Recently, the state government has started to rebuild Malacca River as ‘Venice of the East’. The renovative physical beautification programmes of the river have changed its original functions. The sprouting modern commercialization activities and urbanization of it’s surrounding have increased the levels of human-river relationship. At the same time, river pollution has also begun to occur along with the widening and deepening of the river. All this point to the plain imperative that development, planning and management of the Malacca River should be taken seriously by all parties concerned (government, private sectors, local residents and community) to maintain its cleanliness.