Stakeholder perceptions to support Jurassic Park project as a future wildlife tourism

Septi Fahmi Choirisa,Anton Harianto,Edi Purnomo

doi:10.14254/jems.2021.6-2.7

Abstract

Tourism in protected areas contributes to the financial sustainability of its sites. It has a positive impact on a stakeholder within and beyond the destinations through effective and efficient benefit-sharing. This study examine the environmental attitudes, community attachment, economic gain, and community involvement that will impact to the stakeholder perceptions to revitalization project in Komodo National Park, Indonesia. In the context of protected areas of World Heritage Sites by UNESCO, this project related to the extensive tourism infrastructure development from nature-based tourism to a new project of Jurassic Park. The concerns regarding the stakeholders’ support may have on expectations for tourism development. This research use the Social Exchange Theory (SET) and Weber’s Theory of Substantive and Formal Rationality (WTSFR) with a quantitative approach. A total of 182 questionnaires with Partial Least Squares-Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM) were applied. Finding provides that stakeholder perceptions play a significant role as a mediator in shaping the relationship between each of variables to support tourism development. Ultimately, this study paves the way for improving normative practices toward Sustainability and offers practical solutions to the challenges the government and non-government organizations face to protect the endangered species, society, and the environment.

Highlights

Komodo National Park, Indonesia, was awarded as the World Heritage Sites in 1991 by UNESCO
The current study has investigated the influence of community attachment (e.g Gursoy et al, 2002; Latkova & Vogt, 2012), community involvement (e.g. Nicholas et al, 2009; Rassomalinesh et al, 2017), environmental attitudes (e.g. Nicholas et al, 2009; Gursoy et al, 2002,), and economic gain (e.g Ko & Stewart, 2002; Rasoomalinesh et al, 2015) on the point of view of stakeholders to the tourism development and their subsequent support for it
The findings showed a significant relationship between community attachment, environmental attitude, economic gain, community involvement towards stakeholder perceptions

Summary

Introduction

Komodo National Park, Indonesia, was awarded as the World Heritage Sites in 1991 by UNESCO. Komodo National Park is a flagship for protected area tourism in Indonesia, and surrounding tourism development is expedite to the point where it is a significant local economic sector (Walpole, 2000). If this is to be used as a national and regional example of sustainable tourism, among other things, local support and goodwill for conservation must be nurtured. Without such consent, the natural resource that tourism relies on may be jeopardized

Objectives

Methods

Results

Discussion

Conclusion