Abstract
A survey of tourists to the protected areas in the Taibai Mountain (太白山) Region of China reveals a local domestic market, dominated by students and company employees. The market is attracted by the natural beauty of the Region, but not yet focused on nature based activities in the many protected areas. Given the Region’s assured tourism future based on its natural and cultural characteristics, the survey data are used to discuss strategies for development. The fundamental issue is how to design tourism products targeting different tourist market segments which have different consumption preferences and behaviours and provide sustainable economic benefits to the local community while protecting the natural and cultural assets of this region.
Highlights
Tourists are the most important contributors to the world economy, as well as socio-cultural and eco-environmental systems
Tourist typologies are useful in tourism planning only to the extent that they realistically reflect tourist behaviour and the level of perturbation they bring to the receiving tourism system
This paper reports the results of a study that surveyed tourists from different origins and backgrounds to explore the effects of tourist behaviour on the local community
Summary
Tourists are the most important contributors to the world economy, as well as socio-cultural and eco-environmental systems. Tourist expenditure is the most important source of financial input to the tourism system. Tourist experiences within the tourism system are influenced by, and potentially change, local social (including cultural) and ecological systems. Different tourists behave in very different ways and have different impacts including different expenditure, and bring different changes to local communities. Tourist typologies are useful in tourism planning only to the extent that they realistically reflect tourist behaviour and the level of perturbation they bring to the receiving tourism system. If different tourist types exert different levels of influence on the elements of the tourism experience and the change process, manipulating tourist types is an available management strategy
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