Sustainable Ecotourism Development Research Articles

ECOTOURISM DEVELOPMENT OF MUNJANG MANGROVE FOREST AND CONSERVATION EFFORTS BASED ON COMMUNITY APPROACH

Ecotourism development in a mangrove forest area includes many positive and negative aspects and requires a sustainablecomprehensive study. Ecotourism potential must be assessed to provide understanding of local people in managing natural resources. This study aims at identifying the potential for the development of ecotourism and determining the efforts of conservation strategies for supporting mangrove forests. Data collection was done by questionnaires and interviews using 1-5 Likert scale measurement and SWOT analysis to determine ecotourism development strategies. The results of the study indicates that Munjang mangrove forest has a very good potential to be developed as an ecotourism area. It is supported by the efforts of conservation as the main key in realizing the development of sustainable ecotourism. The role of the community and stakeholders has been well established such as mangrove seeding and nursery activities. Finally, this study recognizes that the capacity of sustainability indicators is very important to map the transformation and constant challenges of supporting mangrove ecotourism, so that it can provide conservation benefits, provide quality services for visitors and improve local communities welfare.

Sustainable ecotourism development using SWOT and QSPM approach: A study on Rameswaram, Tamil Nadu

Promoting religious tourism in Rameswaram has considered its rich and historic footprint and easing tourism infrastructure along the coastal belt of southern most corner state, Tamil Nadu. The prime objective of this study is to offer some strategies for sustainable ecotourism development. The study was based on different empirical analysis including questionnaire and interview surveying of local people, shop-keepers, hotels, and domestic as well foreign visitors. To this end, strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats (SWOT) and based on results a quantitative strategic planning matrix (QSPM) approach were used to manage the proper sustainability of ecotourism. Result showed that Rameswaram was facing so many difficulties regarding visitor's satisfaction level on unique food habit, lodging and services including pollution. So, the current management strategies were explicated that Rameswaram should conduct unsustainable ecotourism. If the local government wants to promote sustainable ecotourism development through some proper or concrete strategies then they must have to work on weaknesses and opportunities that will reduce the environmental effects as well as provide quality of services and make the place strategically tourism hotspot.

Study on Ecological Resources and Tourism Sustainable Development of Xixi Wetland

With the rapid development of the urbanization in China, the wetland ecotourism has become a popular form of travelling for the most of consumers in recent years. The development of the wetland ecotourism not only can enrich the ways of tourism and promote the economic development of the wetland areas, but also can establish a foundation for the comprehensive development of tourism industry. However, as the development of tourism industry in China is not long enough, at present, the wetland ecotourism is still making process. Besides that, due to the lack of scientific understanding, people often ignore the influence and destruction of the tourism ecological resources caused by travelling. And people also ignore the psychological capacity and economic demand of the residents who live in the wetland. This paper intends to carry out a field study on Xixi Wetland to explore the existing problems of the ecotourism on it. And then, according to the result of this research, the corresponding countermeasures of ecotourism are provided based on the analysis of the sustainable development of ecotourism of Xixi Wetland.

Livelihood Security and Sustainability of Ecotourism Destinations in Kerala#

Ecotourism is one emerging subsector in tourism, which has immense potential for Sustainable Development. This development of nature-based tourism in Kerala and the associated tourist demand for the destinations is invariably providing livelihood opportunities and wellbeing of the local communities. The paper unveils livelihood security of the community members and sustainable ecotourism development of the destination. Altogether, 600 samples have been collected from three zones based on active community participation in ecotourism programmes. The data was further analysed using Chi-Square, ANOVA, Correspondence Analysis, and Factor analysis. In addition to this, the Standard of Living Index (SLI) was constructed to understand the wellbeing of the community and Income Poverty Dynamics were estimated to highlight income advancement of the community. The result obtained from the study shows a clear-cut picture of community members in terms of their livelihood pattern and how it helped the community members to overcome the burden of poverty visa- vis sustainable development of the destination. As a result, the marginalised sections inhibited in the forest areas have benefitted immensely from the nature-based ecotourism programmes. The community perception indicates that ecotourism has brought environment and economics benefits, participation of local communities and preservation of local culture.

An Exploratory Study of the Factors that Promote and Delay Sustainable EcoTourism Development in Mansehra

Geographically Mansehra district is situated on Karakoram Highway that links to ancient Taxila, Kashmir, Gilgit-Baltistan, China, and Central Asia. It is the central point for visitors, transportation, exchange, and business in the northern zone. This vicinity is constantly cherished by visitors for its rich potential of tourism attractions with delightful nature, magnificent valleys, and high altitude mountains for adventures and nature lovers. However, this research seeks to make contributions to the present literature of heritage management and tourism development through exploring the rich tourism potential in Mansehra. Exploratory in nature, the study adopts a qualitative technique combining primary and secondary data analysis and scholars observation. The findings reveal that Mansehra has no longer yet been scientifically explored and developed as a tourism destination. The general problems that preclude the development of tourism activities in Mansehra are lack of awareness, basic tourism infrastructure, scientifically exploration and documentation, developmental plan, waste management, conservation, and poor management of cultural and natural sites.

Climate change adaptation and implementation barriers: a qualitative exploration of managers of Dana Biosphere Reserve – ecotourism system

ABSTRACT Increasingly, tourism is negatively impacted by climate change and needs to advance adaptive strategies. This study assessed climate change adaptation measures and barriers to implementation in Dana Biosphere Reserve (DBR), the most important ecotourism destination in Jordan using semi-structured interviews with key informants. It was found that DBR has implemented several adaptation practices, but mostly implicit, including infrastructure development, diversification of tourism products, visitor management, land use management, rainwater collection, environmental monitoring and research, environmental education and collaboration with stakeholders addressing several social, economic and environmental impacts caused by climate change. The results demonstrated that climate change adaptation is closely related to the sustainable development of ecotourism. However, there are considerable barriers that hinder the planning and implementing of climate change adaptation in DBR. Barriers include lack of awareness and concern, insufficient financial and staff resources, uncertainty, and lack of information.

Rural ecotourism planning and design based on SWOT analysis

Abstract With the increasing pace of urban life, people are yearning more and more for a slow-paced rural life. Rural ecotourism is a new type of tourism produced for people to experience rural scenery. In order to ensure the sustainable development of rural eco-tourism, it is necessary to analyze its planning in many aspects. In this study, Tianjin rural eco-tourism was analyzed using the superiority, weakness, opportunity and threats analysis method. Then, according to the analysis, the superiority, weakness, opportunity and threat were obtained, and they were quantitatively analyzed by means of a questionnaire. The results showed that the development of Tianjin rural eco-tourism had four superiorities, i.e. convenient transportation, rich water resources, rich animal and plant resources and rich eco-tourism resources; three weakness, i.e. homogeneous content, unclear theme and low quality of staff; three opportunities, i.e. government support, effective combination of local culture with tourism activities and increased demand for tourism; and two threats, i.e. fierce competition among peers and diversified demands of tourists. In the comprehensive quantitative analysis, the comprehensive scores of superiorities, weakness, opportunities and threats were 3.6, −2.8, 4.4 and −4.4, respectively. To sum up, Tianjin rural ecotourism has superiorities over weakness and equivalent opportunities and threats; i.e. it is basically in a state of sustainable development.

Listen to the Voices from Tourists: Evaluation of Wetland Ecotourism Satisfaction Using an Online Reviews Mining Approach

Scientific evaluation of tourist satisfaction could contribute to the sustainable development of wetland ecotourism. With the development of Web 2.0, online travel reviews increase significantly which provide valuable information for evaluating tourist satisfaction. Hence, this study aims to evaluate the tourist satisfaction of wetland ecotourism in Zhalong National Nature Reserve (ZNNR) based on online travel reviews. Tourist satisfaction evaluation model and sentiment analysis were applied to calculate satisfactions of evaluation factors that were uncovered based on latent dirichlet allocation model. The results suggest that total satisfaction was 0.614, at the fundamentally satisfied level. Moreover, we identified 11 controllable evaluation factors that were key for ZNNR to manage interaction with tourists, and further aggregated these factors into three categories: ecotourism experience, natural resource and cultural resource. Especially, importance-performance analysis further identified the most important evaluation factors according to four-quadrant weight-satisfaction matrix. The proposed analytical framework expands the understanding of the methodological challenges and offers novel perspectives for evaluating the tourist satisfaction. These findings could provide useful insights for the sustainable development of ecotourism and effective management of wetlands.

Analysis of Obstacles to Sustainable Development of Ecotourism in Nature Reserves: A Field Investigation of Three National Nature Reserves in Liaoning Province

Nature reserves are key sites for ecotourism. In the context of sustainable development, a great number of ecotourism practices have been carried out in nature reserves around the world. Important ecotourism practices in nature reserves include the establishment of ecotourism certification systems, the development of management mechanisms promoting effective community participation and the development of standards for ecotourism practices. This paper uses questionnaires, a field investigation and interviews to examine the obstacles influencing the sustainable development of ecotourism in nature reserves, taking three nature reserves in Liaoning Province to serve as examples. The study found that there are two kinds of obstacles to the sustainable development of ecotourism in nature reserves. The first group of obstacles all represent common problems in China including: (1) environmental education is ignored; (2) community participation occurs on an ad hoc basis; (3) tourism management is not rigorous; (4) nature reserve administration is in a state of confrontation with local governments and residents. The second group of obstacles consists of specific problems faced by ecotourism in the three nature reserve, each of which has its own natural, social, cultural and economic environment that generate unique difficulties for ecotourism. In order to promote the healthy improvement of nature reserve ecotourism and achieve the goal of sustainable development, the research team puts forward five suggestions, developing correct understanding, striving to meet the reasonable demands of stakeholders, establishing scientific mechanisms, increasing the social responsibility of management departments of nature reserve ecotourism, and providing separate supervision and management.

Toward the development of sustainable ecotourism in Italian national parks of the Apennines: insights from hiking guides

Toward the development of sustainable ecotourism in Italian national parks of the Apennines: insights from hiking guides

Towards sustainable ecotourism development in Ghana

The study, which focused on Bobiri Forest Reserve and Butterfly Sanctuary in Ghana, sought to identify the challenges that the local communities face in contributing to the sustainability of the Sanctuary, to categorise the benefits that the local communities derive from ecotourism, and to evaluate the local involvement toward the sustainability of the Sanctuary. A mixed-methodological approach was employed in the data collection and analysis. Semi-structured questionnaires were administered to 387 respondents, selected from the six surrounding communities, at the study site. The study also purposively selected and interviewed some key informants. The study revealed that the local communities did not contribute much to the sustainability of the Sanctuary. At the time of the study, the national government received most of its economic benefits at the expense of the local communities. The study recommends the involvement of the neighbouring communities in the development of ecotourism in the Sanctuary, as well as the introduction of structures that help to ensure equitable distribution of the economic benefits accruing from ecotourism.

Stakeholder collaboration as a major factor for sustainable ecotourism development in developing countries

Ecotourism has been widely championed by academics and practitioners as a potential contributor of conservation and development. However, others have questioned whether sustainability goals can be achieved through this form of tourism. Of the various factors reported in the literature as hindering the success of ecotourism, the lack of effective stakeholder collaboration features prominently. This study draws upon stakeholder and collaboration theories and on triple-bottom-line principles, to investigate the contributions of stakeholder collaborations to sustainable ecotourism. The researchers adopted an exploratory research design and conducted stakeholder in-depth interviews and focus group discussions between 2016 and 2018. The findings revealed poor interactions and collaborations amongst ecotourism stakeholders. Consequently, ecotourism in Southern Ethiopia accelerates the degradation of natural resources, neglecting communities while benefiting other ecotourism stakeholders. Therefore, in poorly resourced and remote destinations, failure to empower and participate communities undermines ecotourism and jeopardizes the long-term survival of ecosystems and communities themselves.

Sustainability of marine parks: Is knowledge–attitude–behaviour still relevant?

Marine parks were established to protect the diverse marine ecosystem in Malaysia, and over the years, the islands have attracted an increasing number of tourists. These marine park islands have become not only one of the top ecotourism destinations in Malaysia but an important contributor to the socio-economic growth of the nation. Nonetheless, it is a constant challenge to maintain the marine parks’ natural charm due to negative tourism impacts. Humans’ consumption behaviour has been identified as a driver of climate change. Given that humans’ contribution to the problem is closely related to sustainable behaviour, this study focuses on tourists’ behaviour. With the growing awareness on global environmental challenges, environmental knowledge has often been prescribed as one of the main precursors of tourists’ behaviour, yet few studies have attempted to assess this factor from different dimensions. This paper examines tourists’ environmental knowledge from a multidimensional aspect of factual, conceptual and procedural dimensions to determine its role in influencing attitude and responsible environmental behaviour. A face-to-face survey was conducted among 85 domestic and international marine park tourists, and data were analysed using PLS-SEM method. This preliminary study revealed that environmental knowledge is formatively represented by factual, conceptual and procedural dimensions. Furthermore, results confirmed the linear relationships between knowledge, attitude and behaviour with knowledge as a strong predictor of attitude that leads to higher pro-environmental behaviours, hence highlighting the importance of promoting environmental knowledge among marine park tourists who drives pro-environmental attitude and responsible behaviour to achieve a sustainable ecotourism development.

A New Model of Ecological Carrying Capacity for Developing Ecotourism in the Protected Area of the North Karkheh, Iran

The carrying capacity is one of the most important tools used in planning natural areas for the sustainable development of ecotourism. For this purpose, the first step was to identify the effective factors in determining the ecological potentials and pressures affecting the ECC of ecotourism in the area. The network model between the effective factors was developed, and then, using the ANP model, PSR conceptual model, the region potentials and ECC were determined for the establishment of ecotourism in a scale of 1:50,000. In this research, the relative importance of effective factors in determining the region ecological potentials and pressures affecting the CC of the region was determined using a questionnaire and Delphi method. A total of 70 questionnaires were completed by qualified experts. Then, the physical CC and the ecological pressure levels of the area were calculated and the final map of the ECC was presented for the development of the ecotourism using WLC technique and the Builder model. The results of this study showed that 20% of the area has a high CC (544 ha), 52% of the area has an average CC (1407 ha) and 28% of the area has a low CC (746 ha).

Geospatial based multi-criteria analysis for ecotourism land suitability using GIS & AHP: a case study of Masirah Island, Oman

ABSTRACTOman is characterized by potential diverse landscapes that attract tourists from various countries and regions. In addition, several spatial environments such as plains, mountains, deserts, oases, safaris, islands, and attractive coasts are found across the country, providing prosperous tourism industry features. This research aims to spatially assess land suitability for ecotourism activities in Masirah Island, utilizing the Analytic Hierarchical Process (AHP) method. Thirteen criteria were identified to evaluate suitability of sites for ecotourism activities based on literature review, local knowledge, and field work. The findings revealed 37.39 km2 (5.96%) as highly suitable, 288.84 km2 (46%) as moderately suitable, and 294.46 km2 (47%) as minimally suitable for sustainable ecotourism development across the island. Governmental policymakers and planners can use the outputs of this study as a basis for evaluating the suitability of natural resources for ecotourism development.

Model Development of A Synergistic Sustainable Marine Ecotourism—A Case Study in Pangandaran Region, West Java Province, Indonesia

Coastal areas in the South Coast of West Java Province, Indonesia, have potential to develop marine ecotourism. One specific case is the Pangandaran area which must be transferred into economic value by not damaging natural resources. Marine ecotourism development is not only intended to raise foreign exchange for the local government, but is also expected to play a role in maintaining natural resources sustainably. This research aims to analyze the sustainable synergistic marine ecotourism development model. The method used in this research is the quantitative descriptive method. The quantitative descriptive method is used to describe the general condition of the research area, using primary and secondary data. The technique includes the taking of respondents using accidental sampling as many as 50 respondents, consisting of tourists, public figures, and fishermen who have side jobs as providers of marine ecotourism services. The analysis is carried out through the Rapfish modeling approach to measure the synergistic elements of sustainable development of marine ecotourism. Based on the results of the research the ecological dimension of environmental services are the most influential conditions, the economic dimension of marine ecotourism is a less influential condition. Meanwhile, marine ecotourism technology and the social dimension of marine ecotourism are least influential conditions. In regard to infrastructure and regulatory dimensions, the use of information technology is recommended to promote marine ecotourism optimally. It is also concluded that regulations are needed to establish marine ecotourism zoning rules and infrastructure improvements.

Toward sustainable ecotourism development: an assessment of the benefits and environmental threats of Lake Bosomtwe ecotourism facility

ABSTRACTStrategies for redesigning ecotourism facilities for the sustenance of their benefits are limited in the conventional literature.To address this gap, this study assesses the benefits and challenges of the Lake Bosomtwe ecotourism facility in Ghana. Data were obtained from 136 respondents who were carefully selected from the facility’s catchment. The results indicate the facility makes profound contribution to local economic development. However, poor environmental practices (poor waste management and agricultural practices) within the catchment area hamper the sustenance of the facility and its benefits.This study outlines strategies for redesigning the Lake Bosomtwe ecotourism facility to sustain its benefits.

A Study on the Factors and Enhancement Strategies of Environmental Responsibility of Eco-Tourists

With the rapid development of eco-tourism, the environmental problems caused by it become more and more prominent. Therefore, based on the behavioral characteristics of eco-tourists and the relevant factors affecting tourists’ environmental responsibility behavior, this paper puts forward some suggestions and countermeasures from the perspectives of eco-tourism developers, operators and local residents to improve the ecological environment of scenic spots, reduce the cost of environmental protection, and promote the virtuous cycle and sustainable development of eco-tourism.

Significance of sustainable eco-tourism for Serbia's economic development

Sustainable development of eco-tourism in Serbia has great prospects and opportunities for the intensification of entrepreneurship based on natural resources in rural and mountainous areas. In the world after euphoria due to staying in hotelsskyscrapers, ice hotels, boat hotels and other exotic places with Japanese, Thai, Italian and French specialties, tourists return to the gentle landscapes, primal values and ethnic food. Food producers in Serbia have potential on large areas of fertile soils and pastures, high-quality varieties of crops, good breeds of sheep, pigs, cows, goats and mangules. There is practically no general marketing and promotion of the tourist offer in our country, as well as branding of Serbian food products for placement on world markets. To attract investment, it is necessary to develop Serbian tourism brands and promote eco-tourism in mountainous and rural areas at international fairs. Hunting, fishing, hiking, trekking and horseback riding, supplemented by the consumption of ethnic food and organic food products, marked with local brands and geographical origin can make a significant contribution to the sustainability of tourism, ecotourism and other forms of entrepreneurship in Serbia.

Sustainable Ecological Tourism Development in the Republic of Kazakhstan: Problems and Prospects

This article is devoted to problems of development of sustainable ecotourism in Kazakhstan. The methodological part made it possible to show the potential for sustainable ecotourism in the country. The practical part is dedicated to identifying and solving the problems of the development of this type of sustainable tourism. Also, works were carried out to determine the maximum capacity of specially protected natural areas.