Influences of Perceived Environment Uncertainty on Sustainable Destination Management Practices for Malaysian Tour Operators’ Businesses

Abstract

Sustainable development has emerged as an important consideration in global tourism development. Realising the importance of this type of development, tour operators are encouraged to be more involved in their roles for destination sustainability. In addition, it is important to determine the factors that may influence the adoption of sustainability among tour operators in Malaysia. Therefore, the objective of this paper is to determine the influence of perceived environment uncertainty among tour operators towards the adoption of sustainable destination management practices based on the changes of customer demand, advanced technology and government regulation factors. For this study, the quantitative method was utilised by using semi-structured questionnaire, whereby data obtained from 192 respondents were analysed using SEM PLS 3.0 to determine the relationship of these factors. The results indicated that changes in market demand and government regulations influenced the adoption of sustainable destination management practices, whereas changes in advanced technology posed no impact on such practices. This was suggestive of tour operators’ businesses that need to be more alert towards the changes in market demand for the tourism industry in Malaysia, as well as changes in governmental regulations and policies. Future research would be useful in assessing the effect of tourist’s demands for sustainability, as well as the identification of other factors that may influence the adoption of sustainability in tour operator businesses, as these areas are gaining much attention across the tourism industry worldwide.