Negotiating stakeholder solutions to complex visitor management problems: the case of traffic management in the Kruger National Park

Abstract

Increasing visitor numbers in wildlife tourism destinations creates a number of issues in relation to visitor management. Developing traffic and visitor policies, while taking into consideration the varying desires and needs of different visitor and organisational stakeholder groups, is a daunting task. Using the situation in the Kruger National Park (KNP) in South Africa, this paper demonstrates how through the combined use of focus groups and the Delphi technique, negotiated stakeholder solutions can be reached between seemingly opposed wildlife tourism and conservation user groups. Traffic congestion has been a major problem in the southern section of the Kruger National Park and has contributed towards reduced visitor satisfaction with the wildlife watching experience in the Park. Focus group discussions with nine different stakeholder groups identified major traffic related problems that participants agreed needed to be addressed and an extensive range of suggestions for improving perceived traffic congestion problems. Applying a Delphi process to these suggestions resulted in a high level of consensus across all stakeholder groups regarding actions management should take to address traffic problems in the Park.