The Role of Private Wildlife Reserves in Nicaragua's Emerging Ecotourism Industry

Ecotourism promises to be the fastest growing segment of Nicaragua's fledgling tourist industry, which is already the country's second highest generator of foreign exchange. Development of a lucrative ecotourism industry offers a unique opportunity for Nicaragua to unify economic growth with natural resource stewardship in a single sustainable development strategy. However, as ecotourism is largely dependent on protected area systems, the current condition of Nicaragua's public protected area system is a major obstacle to the industry's development. Limited by inadequate public financing, the establishment of private wildlife reserves can compliment Nicaragua's under-developed public protected area system, further enhancing the desirability of Nicaragua as an ecotourist destination. The opportunities and constraints of private reserve establishment are examined in this study of Nicaragua's first legally recognised private wildlife reserve.     

Local community participation in ecotourism and conservation issues in two nature reserves in Nicaragua

This paper explores the factors influencing community participation in ecotourism and how this affects conservation in the Nature Reserves of Mombacho Volcano and Datanlí-El Diablo in Nicaragua. Information was collected using individual structured and semi-structured interviews and focus groups, with local people, farmers and tour operators, combining quantitative and qualitative techniques. The farmers in the two communities are engaged in the protection of the reserves because of environmental concern and also because their own welfare is at stake. In different ways, the farmers and communities benefit from ecotourism, but not enough. Either they are excluded from the management system, or they lack resources to promote the sites and improve infrastructure. Community participation is to a large extent dependent on the management system, but it is not the only aspect required to make ecotourism successful. A minimum of governmental support to infrastructure and local entrepreneurship is required. In the case presented, there are direct economic benefits from ecotourism, as the records of visitors illustrate. But there are many differences between the two reserves and their communities, illustrating that ecotourism development is complex and demanding, and demonstrating that ecotourism is not a “one size fits all” approach to sustainable development.     

Attaining harmony: understanding the relationship between ecotourism and protected areas in China

This paper explores the power of both traditional culture and modernity, their interaction, and ecotourism as defined and developed in China, and suggests a new framework for ecotourism policies. It argues that issues in ecotourism should reflect scientific and empirical evidence, but also integrate traditional Chinese cultural beliefs, and political and social factors, to achieve sustainability. The protected area system, central to ecotourism in China, was introduced by government to bring modernity and globalization. The management model follows western values, tending to separate humans from nature for conservation purposes, using institutionalized western zoning systems. This approach is inconsistent with millennia-old Chinese cultural values about relationships between nature and humans, centred around tian ren he yi – humans and nature as a unified entity. Instead of managing conflicts, attaining harmony (in a subjective experiential way) is the fundamental Chinese approach. The paper explores conflicts between the two value systems, and how Confucian “middle ways” are being crafted to balance the fast-growing special needs of Chinese eco-tourists with the top-down regulation of protected areas. It notes new developments in protected area tourism management in the West, and opportunities to blend Chinese traditional values about harmony with evolving western practice.     

Can Ecotourism Interpretation Really Lead to Pro-Conservation Knowledge,Attitudes and Behaviour? Evidence from the Galapagos Islands

Proponents of ecotourism within protected areas believe that tour design and interpretation can help mitigate the negative impacts of tourism, human and environmental, and build an educated and motivated constituency that supports environmental conservation and social improvements. However, ecotourism's claims to achieve those objectives are largely untested, and linkages between tourism's operational characteristics and positive changes in tourists” environmental knowledge, attitudes and behaviours are largely unexplored. This exploratory research investigated the efforts of one Galapagos National Park tour operator to explore whether a well-conceived interpretation/ecotourism product could influence tourists” educational outcomes and support of environmental conservation. Results suggest that well-designed and delivered interpretation during the ecotourism experience can increase knowledge of the host-protected area, supportive attitudes towards resource management issues facing the host-protected area, general environmental behavioural intentions and philanthropic support of conservation.     

Evaluating ecotourism: The case of North Sulawesi, Indonesia

Ecotourism can contribute to both conservation and development and involves, as a minimum, positive synergistic relationships between tourism, biodiversity and local people, facilitated by appropriate management. This paper applies a framework for the development and evaluation of ecotourism to three protected areas in North Sulawesi. Due to its spectacular endemic biodiversity, the potential for providing quality nature experiences in North Sulawesi is high and tourism development is occurring rapidly. Site-level evaluations of ecotourism in three protected areas were performed to illustrate the application and the utility of the framework as a tool for evaluation and to assess the status of tourism in North Sulawesi. It is revealed that current relationships between people, resources and tourism in North Sulawesi have yet to provide the mutual benefits necessary for successful ecotourism. The approach and framework used to arrive at these conclusions have wide applicability for assessing the achievements of ecotourism at specific sites and for directing appropriate management strategies for ecotourism in protected areas.     

A Protected Areas Ecotourism Competitive Cluster Approach to Catalyse Biodiversity Conservation and Economic Growth in Bulgaria

This paper focuses on how small ecotourism and related supply chain businesses in gateway communities can be linked to protected areas by organising them into competitive clusters focused on their comparative advantages and uniqueness. It examines pilot project work in Bulgaria in small communities near the Rila and Central Balkan National Park. It shows how Bulgaria might develop its ecotourism potential by replicating this approach. The Bulgarian experience holds potential for replication in other protected areas and gateway communities using collaborative tools based upon lessons learned from the model sites and from ecotourism cases around the world, including: (1) developing an inclusive stakeholder group; (2) fostering education within gateway communities near protected areas; (3) strengthening the legal and regulatory framework; (4) expanding small and medium size enterprises (SMEs) and entrepreneurship opportunities; (5) expanding destination management capacity at the community level; (6) linking protected area sites to less visited areas; (7) implementing environmental management and certification programmes; (8) expanding financing for protected areas; (9) using the Internet for linking and branding the network; and (10) developing indicator or monitoring systems.     

“This is a holy place of Ama Jomo”: buen vivir,indigenous voices and ecotourism development in a protected area of Bhutan

Common definitions of ecotourism address the need to benefit the well-being of local people; in reality, ecotourism is often supported or dominated by external agents. Local ideological, social and cultural values may be overlooked, thereby disenfranchising local and indigenous stakeholders. This paper examines indigenous perceptions of ecotourism and well-being, and how they relate to ecotourism practices in three Brokpa communities of the first protected area in Bhutan to become a special tourism destination. A range of methods (e.g. semi-structured interviews, participatory mapping) was used and data analysis was couched in the context of buen vivir (living well), an indigenous concept of well-being. Findings indicate that: (1) perceptions of ecotourism vary between community members and contrast with the official park definition; (2) well-being is conceived in diverse ways but corresponds to key features of buen vivir; (3) indigenous worldviews are pervasive, and shape social values and spiritual beliefs in connection to nature; and (4) indigenous cosmologies and traditional values may be strengthened through their integration into modern policies and institutions. This research contributes more non-Western voices to the literature, a concept and mode of analysis for well-being that embraces an indigenous ontology, and empirical insights on indigenous communities in protected areas.     

An evaluation of ecotourism in Amazonas, Brazil

Registered “ecotour” lodges were studied using observation and interviews with visitors, employees, and local people. Findings were evaluated using proposed ecotourism principles. Besides providing employment, lodges improve access, stimulate new services (health utilities, etc.), and make valued but limited local purchases. In other ways, lodges fall short of the ideals inherent in the principles. They contribute little to conservation education, resource protection, or the involvement and empowerment of local people. Tourists wish to see and would support conservation and community development programs both financially and via their future selection of ecotour operators. Numerous implications for concessions, protected area management, and rural development in Amazonas are discussed.     

Who wins and who loses? Unpacking the “local people” concept in ecotourism: a longitudinal study of community equity in Ankarana,Madagascar

Tourism in the Ankarana protected area, Madagascar, has increased since the early 1990s, linked to growing national and donor interest in conservation and ecotourism. Using a qualitative and longitudinal approach, this analysis focuses on the social impacts of tourist intensification, comparing and contrasting communities on either side of the protected area. As tourist numbers have increased, infrastructure to accommodate them has developed and tour guiding has professionalized. In this process, the locus of tourism shifted from the loosely organized, “grassroots” tourism of the western side of Ankarana to the organized, externally financed, easy-access tourism of the eastern side, with both environmental and social consequences. The paper argues that a concentration and professionalization of ecotourism services within a region can marginalize neighboring human communities even though not necessarily leading to increased overall environmental degradation. It contributes to tourism studies by engaging a political ecology approach to unpack the concept of “local people” through a multi-community study of the ripple effects of ecotourism within its immediately surrounding areas. This study of community equity acknowledges the need for balanced evaluations of tourism's effects. It also recognizes the value of nuanced empirical studies for planning to meet goals of location-specific environmental and socioeconomic sustainability.     

Can ecotourism deliver real economic,social, and environmental benefits? A study of the Osa Peninsula,Costa Rica

Doubt persists about ecotourism's ability to make tangible contributions to conservation and deliver benefits for host communities. This work in Costa Rica's Osa Peninsula tests the hypothesis that ecotourism in this region is more effective at improving well-being for local residents, at enhancing their access to key resources and information, and at supporting biodiversity conservation than other locally available economic sectors. Data from 128 semi-structured interviews with local workers, both in ecotourism and in other occupations, together with associated research, indicate that ecotourism offers the best currently available employment opportunities, double the earnings of other livelihoods, and other linked benefits. Locally, ecotourism is viewed as the activity contributing most to improvements in residents’ quality of life in the Osa Peninsula and to increased levels of financial and attitudinal support for parks and environmental conservation. Ecolodge ownership by local people is substantial, and many local ecotourism workers plan to launch their own businesses. The data offer a convincing rebuttal to arguments that ecotourism does little to address poverty or disparities in access to resources and equally rebuts claims that ecotourism is simply a part of the “neoliberal conservation toolkit” that cannot help but exacerbate the very inequalities it purports to address.     

Alternative Tourism and Sustainable Development in Kenya

This article examines alternative tourism and especially the form dubbed ecotourism and assesses its prospects for sustainable development in Kenya. It also considers community participation in ecotourism, the Kenya government policy on ecotourism, and the initiatives to yield sustainable development in the country. The findings show that biodiversity conservation encourages and supports tourism which, in turn, provides money for conservation efforts and local development programmes. However, ecotourism has not necessarily led to small scale, locally owned tourism enterprises expected in the ecotourism model. The analysis shows nevertheless that alternative tourism development has drawn attention to the role of local people in biodiversity conservation, the basis of ecotourism. Hopefully, this will lead to greater local participation in the ownership, management and control of ecotourism enterprises.     

Tourism on organic farms in South Korea: a new form of ecotourism≟

This exploratory research examines the potential of organic farms in South Korea to enable a distinct form of environmentally sustainable tourism. Case studies involving in-depth interviews with three organic farms and content analysis of the websites of 38 organic farms offering tourism-related activities were conducted. An analytical framework using key ecotourism principles was developed to guide an evaluation of activities and practices on the farms. Organic farmers in the study were concerned about ecological conditions on their land, possessed close ties to that land, and employed related knowledge to help preserve natural habitat and minimize adverse environmental impacts. Social–cultural gains were evident, for both visitors and local inhabitants. It is argued that this type of tourism on organic farms may be a potentially new form of ecotourism (eco-organic farm tourism). The study suggests that ecotourism principles may be usefully applied as a guiding sustainability paradigm for small scale, organic farms engaging in tourism. This new tourism type can be employed as a strategy for facilitating sustainable agriculture, local development, social–cultural and environmental conservation, wellbeing, and learning. Further research needs to be carried out both in Korea and elsewhere to develop this eco-organic farm tourism concept.     

The Ecotourium Concept and Tourism-Conservation Symbiosis

The credibility of contemporary ecotourism is threatened by the global dominance of a model that minimally fulfils the three core criteria – nature-based attractions, learning opportunities, ecological and sociocultural sustainability – that characterise this sector. A more rigorous ‘comprehensive’ model is better capable of fulfilling ecotourism’s potential to achieve sustainable outcomes, but only if this model embraces both the hard and soft dimensions of the sector. Based on the latter premise and informed by the principles of complexity, knowledge sharing and interdisciplinarity, we propose the development of an international network of protected areas ‘ecotouriums’ that is designed to stimulate positive socioeconomic change within local communities and maintain and improve the ecological health of protected areas. Cornerstone themes that enable the ecotourium concept are research and education, ecological health, community participation and development, and partnerships.     

Can Sanctions and Rewards Explain Conformance Behaviour of Tour Operators with Ecotourism Guidelines?

Ecotourism's appeal as a conservation and development tool rests in its potential to provide local economic benefits while maintaining ecological resource integrity through low-impact, non-consumptive resource use. Some, however, question its contribution to conservation and community development, citing negative impacts, such as solid waste generation, habitat destruction, and sociocultural ills. This paper, based on a comparative study in Costa Rica, explores some of these issues. Study findings were mixed regarding ecotourism's effectiveness as a conservation and community development tool. Survey respondents saw legal restrictions as more influential than tourism in prompting declines in deforestation and hunting rates. Likewise, respondents did not feel tourism operators were significant players in raising environmental awareness. The research also revealed that direct employment in ecotourism was associated with pro-conservation practices, but indirect benefits showed stronger associations in generating pro-conservation perspectives. Little evidence was found to suggest that people are investing tourism-generated income in environmentally threatening practices. Research findings also indicated that scale influences tourism's benefits and negative impacts and that, where ecotourism dominates local economies, towns may become economically vulnerable. The paper concludes by recognising that ecotourism would be most effective as a component of a broader conservation strategy and offers suggestions to improve ecotourism's potential.     

Changing Conceptions of Protected Areas and Conservation: Linking Conservation,Ecological Integrity and Tourism Management

From their first creation, national parks and equivalent reserves were socially constructed in the New World as static, primordial, untouched representations of a pre-European contact environment characterised by the ‘balance of nature’ resting in a steady (climax) state. While these images still linger in the minds of the public, the recent utilisation of landscape ecology, conservation biology and social constructivism to study and re-conceptualise protected areas has demonstrated that parks are not the protected islands of virgin wilderness they were constructed to represent; rather than protecting these areas from disturbance, we now recognise that disturbance is a major component in ecological integrity. We suggest that the resultant shift from species- to process-based conservation (i.e. ecological integrity), from attempting to cocoon parks from outside influences to re-engaging parks with landscape-level processes, has critical ramifications for protected area and sustainable tourism management. Land managers need to adapt to a new paradigm that reflects and supports this philosophical change in conservation principles; this shift is also reflected in science itself, manifested by a move from normal to ‘post-normal’ science which embraces these new principles. This approach should link visitor expectations with dynamic, non-linear, self-organising natural processes in order to meet conservation objectives.     

Assessment of the changing levels of livelihood assets in the Kampong Phluk community with implications for community-based ecotourism

In recent years, international attention has been rendered to development of ecotourism for poverty reduction and biodiversity conservation. We assessed local livelihood assets in Kampong Phluk Community before and after the introduction of the community-based ecotourism (CBET) governance system, where it was previously under the private company management system (SEAPAC). We used a sustainable livelihood framework to assess natural, physical, human, social, and financial assets by analyzing a set of panel data of 150 observations according to the scoring scale of zero (total dissatisfaction) to one (total satisfaction). We found that full implementation of CBET raised the overall average score of livelihood assets by 0.15. In particular, physical capital and human capital achieved remarkable growth by 0.25 to 0.23, respectively, while growth in natural capital and financial capital was statistically insignificant. Although CBET showed promising results, improving communication and providing community health care would motivate active participation in ecotourism development.     

Barriers to Ecotourism Supplier Success: A Comparison of Agency and Business Perspectives

Many small businesses catering to ecotourists' needs have emerged in response to an increasingly important ecotourism sector, but high turnover rates reduce benefits to owners, communities and visitors. The objective of this study was to compare agency and business perspectives on barriers affecting ecotourism suppliers. Understanding the similarities and differences between the views of agencies and businesses on ecotourism supplier success can help identify some fundamental steps needed to strengthen the ecotourism sector and to more effectively manage the natural resource base. Data were collected through key informant interviews of stakeholders associated with the ecotourism sector in Pennsylvania and Maryland in the United States. Key informants were business owners, tour operators and outfitters, state and local government personnel, natural resource managers working on public lands, and conservation leaders. Forty-five interviews were conducted. Data were qualitatively analyzed using content analysis. Qualitative Solutions and Research, Non-numerical Unstructured Data – Indexing, Searching and Theorising (QSR NUD*IST), a computer-based tool, was used to facilitate the content analysis. Results show that while agency and business interviewees agree on some barriers associated with the success of ecotourism suppliers, differences exist on their perspectives of providers' needs and ecotourism's role in the local economy.     

A geography of ecotourism in Cambodia: regions,patterns, and potentials

Tourism visits to Cambodia have expanded rapidly, with over 5 million visitors arriving in the country by 2016. Angkor Wat remains the primary tourist attraction, but increasing numbers of tourists also visit ecotourism destinations. This study draws on Weaver’s [(2002). Asian ecotourism: Patterns and themes. Tourism Geographies, 4(2), 153–172] spatial and structural analysis of ecotourism in Asia as an organizing framework to develop a geography of ecotourism in Cambodia. In a comprehensive review of academic publications, reports, online ecotourism clearinghouses, and project websites, 30 Cambodian ecotourism sites were identified based on 5 ecotourism criteria. A content analysis of ecotourism project websites was then conducted to group together ecotourism sites with common characteristics in particular geographic regions. Each site was plotted on a Google Terrain map, and local and regional terrain, land cover, transport, and other physical features were analyzed, supplemented by detailed geographical data from Google Panorama, Earth, and Satellite map functions. Three relatively distinct ecotourism regions were identified: the (a) mangrove and rainforest region, (b) highland trekking region, and (c) wetlands and waterways region. For each region, tourism gateways and ecotourism development challenges and potentials are elaborated. The paper concludes with a discussion of study findings and their implications for ecotourism development in Cambodia.     

中国生态旅游研究热点演变与趋势——基于CiteSpace知识图谱分析

生态旅游是旅游研究中的重要分支,在可持续发展理念和生态文明建设实践的影响和培育下,我国生态旅游理论研究和实践都取得了长足的进展。本文选取CNKI中国学术期刊网络出版总库的中文核心期刊和CSSCI来源期刊,对高关注度文献、关键词、作者、期刊特征进行了分析,基于CiteSpace知识图谱分析,结合生态旅游实践发展,将中国生态旅游研究划分为3个阶段,探索阶段的研究主要集中于内涵和理念的认知,发展阶段的研究热点主要有自然保护区域、生态旅游发展和生态建设等,深化阶段的研究主题更丰富,与乡村振兴、生态文明等战略的联系更紧密。最后,从基础理论与研究框架构建、生态旅游地健康价值与知识内涵、典型地域系统性研究、市场规律与培育、生态旅游影响及其演化规律、与地域文化互动融合、管理技术与社区参与7个方面对未来中国生态旅游研究趋势进行了预测。     

迈向可持续目标的中国生态旅游发展研究

生态旅游是自然保护地体系建设、国土空间保护利用、美丽中国等重点生态文明工程建设的重要载体。本文对生态旅游发展研究进行了深入分析,探讨了迈向可持续发展目标下中国生态旅游发展研究需要关注的重点领域。研究认为：生态旅游对于联合国可持续发展目标（Sustainable Development Goals, SDG）实现具有多维促进作用,大众生态旅游在现代化管理制度、技术规范和生态文明的中国话语体系中具有较强的适用性。当代中国生态旅游发展具有与以往国外后工业化时期生态旅游完全不同的时代特点,外部环境和关联要素正在不断促使生态旅游发展寻求新的发展路径。自然生态、地域功能、承载能力和经济发展共同勾画出当代中国生态旅游的发展图景,未来研究需要建立以资源环境容量为底线、以生态游憩机会图谱和时空匹配为规律、以空间治理和现代化管控为提升、以强约束低损耗的政策和技术标准为配套的四位一体发展体系,从而为中国实现生态环境严格保护和经济社会可持续发展多元目标提供支撑。