SUSTAINABLE AND

RESPONSIBLE DEVELOPMENT

(updated February 2015) Sourced from the Lesson Plan for Principles of Tourism II

OBJECTIVES Define the meaning of sustainability and

sustainable tourism

Discuss the importance of sustainability and the role of the industry

Identify the concept of carrying capacity and the difficulties involved in applying that concept to the real world.

UNIT TOPICS

• Definitions of Sustainability

• What is Sustainable Tourism?

• Definitions of Sustainable Tourism

• Sustainability of Tourism

• Economic aspects, Environmental aspects or Socio-cultural aspects working against sustainable tourism

• Thresholds and carrying capacity

• The process of determining carrying capacity

• Sustainable tourism products

• Sustainability as a strategy

Definitions of Sustainability The Brutland Report(1987) defined sustainability to be ‘meeting the needs of

the present generation without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs’ and it went on to identify some basic principles of sustainability.

The identified needs were to:

• Take a holistic approach to planning and strategy;

• Protect the environment (biodiversity) and man-made heritage;

• Preserve the essential ecological processes;

• Facilitate and engage public participation;

• Ensure the productivity can be sustained into the long-term future and

• Provide for a better level of fairness and opportunity between different countries.

The proponents of sustainability can be subdivided into two school of thought:

1. Those that may be classified as strong or full sustainable supporters

2. Those that may be deemed to be weak or partial sustainable supporters.

WHAT IS SUSTAINABLE TOURISM?

Tourism that takes full account of its

current and future economic, social

and environmental impacts,

addressing the need of visitors, the

industry, the environment and host

communities.

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Simplistically we can categorize them into four types of capital stock:

Human: the population, welfare, health, workforce, educational and skill base.

Physical: productive capital such as machinery, equipment, buildings.

Socio-cultural: well being, social cohesion, empowerment, equity, cultural heritage.

Environment: nature

SUSTAINABILITY AND CAPITAL STOCKS

Human Capital

Physical Capital

Environmental Capital

Socio-cultural Capital

Economic Activity (production and consumption)

Investment (replacement and

induced)

Total Human Welfare

What is Sustainable Tourism?

Preserving the current resources base for future generations.

Maintaining the productivity of the resource base.

Maintaining biodiversity and avoiding irreversible environmental changes.

Ensuing equity between and within generations.

Maintaining and protecting the heritage of the area, region or nation.

DEFINITIONS OF SUSTAINABLE TOURISM

THE WTO outlined that sustainable tourism should:

Make optimal use of environmental resources (while maintaining the essential ecological processes while helping to conserve the natural heritage and biodiversity)

Respect the sociocultural authenticity of those communities (helping to conserve the cultural heritage and traditional values as well as seeking to engender intercultural understanding tolerance)

Ensure viable, long-term economic operations, providing socioeconomic benefits to all stakeholders

SUSTAINABILITY OF TOURISM

Economic aspects working against sustainable tourism

Environmental aspects working against sustainable tourism

Socio-cultural aspects working against sustainable tourism

THRESHOLDS AND CARRYING CAPACITY

Tourism activity exceeding the thresholds is likely to affect every facet of tourism development. For instance, exceeding:

Physical thresholds will limit the volume of tourist flows and expose tourists to safety hazards.

Environmental thresholds will limit the tourists flows by creating secondary problems, such as health hazards, or detract from the attractiveness of a destination.

Socio an cultural thresholds will generate resentment and antagonism towards tourists from the host population.

Tourist flows thresholds will affect the satisfaction levels of tourists and cause them to search elsewhere for a better products.

Economic thresholds will result in misallocation of resources and factors of production

CARRYING CAPACITY

“the maximum number of people who can use a site without an unacceptable alteration in the

physical environment and without an unacceptable decline in the quality of

experience gained by visitors”

(Mathieson and Wall,1982)

When attempting to identify the levels of carrying capacity, to weigh the absolute numbers of tourist arrivals to take account of a number of factors as follows:

• The average length of stay;

• The characteristics of tourist and hosts;

• The geographical concentration of tourist;

• The degree of seasonality;

• The type of tourism activity;

• The accessibility of specific sites;

• The level of infrastructure use and its spare capacity;

• The extent of spare capacity among the various productive sectors of the economy.

The determinants and influences of carrying capacity

Local Factors Alien Factos

Planning prcoess

Management of development

Technology

IMPACTS ON

Society Culture Environment Economy

Parameters Standards

Current carrying Capacity

Tourists

T he present level of carrying capacity soon becomes accepted and this level of acceptance influences the local and alien factors at the top of the process

and modifies tolerance levels throughout in this way carrying

capacities can be extended overtime

These affect local and alien factor

The interaction between local and alien factors, directed and governed by the planning process, will determine the

impacts

THE PROCESS OF DETERMINING CARRYING CAPACITY

LOCAL FACTORS Social structure Cultural heritage Environment Economic structure Political structure Resources

ALIEN FACTORS • Tourist characteristics • Types of tourist activity • Planning, management ad technology

IMPACTS • Parameters •Standards •Carrying capacity determination

SUSTAINABLE TOURISM PRODUCTS

• Eco-tourism is unequivocally linked to natural tourism attractions rather than their man-made counterparts and environmental sustainability is often to be a core component of such a product’s definition. • Eco-tourism demands a high level of interpretation whereas the mass tourism product does not. • Both eco-tourism and alternative imply small-scale, indigenous low-key activities. •Eco-tourism suggest that it has in place constraints that will prevent or inhibit uncontrolled development. • Both forms of tourism activity ca provide a temporary runway for the take-off of the destination as it moves towards mass tourism.

SUSTAINABLE TOURISM PRODUCTS

The 10 Rs

The Three Rs

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

Recognize, Refuse, Replace, Reduce, reuse, Recycle, Re-engineer, Retrain, Reward, Re-educate

SUSTAINABILITY AS A STRATEGY

• Sustainability more than anything else involves a process of recognition and responsibility. • A sustainable strategy must engage all of the stakeholders in the planning of tourism • Economic sustainability for tourism requires holistic planning across all industrial sectors •The quality of the tourism product demands staff training that is universally acceptable and the economic environment must make environmentally and socio-culturally sound behavior the best economic choice.

SUSTAINABILITY AS A STRATEGY

•Environmental sustainability in tourism requires greater awareness and knowledge about the impacts and ways of translating those impacts into the economic marketplace. •The indirect and induce environmental consequences of activities must be included in the calculation of their market prices but it must also be recognized that environmental and social system change over time as a natural consequence of development and such changes need to be accommodated