The International Ecotourism Society defines ecotourism as “responsible travel to natural areas that conserves the environment, sustains the well-being of the local people, and involves interpretation and education.”4 I’ve been lucky enough to take two trips that I would consider ecotourism with my family - one in the Costa Rican rainforest, and one around several of the Galapagos islands. Those experiences were a huge reason why I applied for this seminar, and I’m really excited to see the Tasmanian ecological systems up close and in person. But I have always been curious about whether ecotourism is really beneficial for the naturals places we visit. Or rather, I suppose I don’t doubt the benefits of ecotourism as defined above - that’s clearly great! Rather, I wonder if there are plenty of operations masquerading as ecotourism adventures, who really are damaging the local environment and people.
My Costa Rica and Galapagos trips were interesting in their contrast. The Costa Rica hotel was composed of several large lodges and huts well spaced throughout the jungle, with no more than 100 visitors + staff on site at any time. We walked everywhere, ate simply from large cafeteria style platters, and were completely disconnected from most modern conveniences like hot water or air conditioning. The Galapagos experience was much more commercialized and luxurious - we traveled everywhere on a boat with a hot tub on deck, meals served restaurant style. It generally felt like a cruise, interspersed with daily forays onto the islands with admittedly expert, conscientious guides.
It seems impossible that human exploration of any significant kind could be less impactful than pure conservation. But, I don’t think that is necessarily a fair standard to hold ecotourism too. I think ecotourism can be considered beneficial for the environment if it is better than what would happen to the land, plants and animals if it didn’t exist. This is a much lower bar, since revenues from ecotourism can be used to purchase and protect vast swathes of land that might otherwise be purchased for development, farming, logging, etc.
In this light, I believe Tasmanian ecotourism provides an income stream that allows the country to justify maintaining extensive undeveloped World Heritage sites, and is therefore net positive.7,8,9 Ecotourism accounted for $2.4 billion and 28,000 jobs in Tasmania’s economy - it is the second largest industry and a vital focus for future growth.11
However, just because ecotourism is better than alternatives like logging does not place it above criticism. Construction of nature lodges and the necessary infrastructure is inherently changing the environment in obvious ways, and nature tourism sites are economically incentivized to make their locales more attractive to plants and animals that attract tourists, like primates for example. Ecotourism is a force for good when done correctly, but we should be careful to distinguish between operators that truly care about conservation and protection and those out to make a buck on the latest fad.
I’m excited for our trip - it is clearly nature-based and will focus on education, and I’m curious to see how we give back to locals and whether we think our exploration is sustainable after we’ve done it.
References
No comments:
Post a Comment