Sustainability and alternative tourism

To conclude this chapter, we return to the subject of alternative tourism and, in particular, the question of how far do the so-called ‘alternative’ forms of tourism provide templates for sustainable tourism in general? There is perhaps a natural temptation to view the mass forms of packaged tourism as the least sustainable and the style of tourism that is most likely to bring widespread environmental change. In contrast, alternative forms of tourism (which are often characterised by their smaller scale, the involvement of local people, a preference for remoter areas and a predilection to place enjoyment of nature, landscape and cultures at the centre of the tourism experience) outwardly appear more in tune with principles of sustainability. Further, the alluring names that are commonly given to alternative forms of tourism – ‘green tourism’, ‘eco-tourism’, ‘soft tourism’ and ‘responsible tourism’ – tend to reinforce a popular belief that sustainability can only be equated with alternative tourism. Such views do, however, need to be accorded considerable caution, for although the underlying philosophies of alternative tourism may strongly reflect the concept of sustainability, the experience of alternative tourism in a growing number of places suggests that such forms may be highly potent as agents of change and generators of impact. In fact, alternative tourism can be just as problematic, in development terms, as mass forms of tourism.

The risks attached to a simple equation of alternative tourism with sustainability may be illustrated by a closer look at what is arguably the most prominent of the so-called alternatives – ecotourism. Fennell (1999: 43) has defined ecotourism as ‘natural resource-based tourism that focuses primarily on experiencing and learning about nature and which is ethically managed to be low impact, non-consumptive and locally-oriented’. Ecotourism thus strives to minimise impacts upon environments and local people, increase awareness and understanding of natural areas and their cultural systems, and contribute to the conservation and management of those areas and systems (Wallace and Pierce, 1996).

improvement schemes – such as health and sanitation projects – and a system of tourist levies that are intended to support a fund on which communities may draw to meet the costs of local projects. Environmental education programmes (especially through neighbourhood forums) have been established in over 80 locations across the province. In this way the conservation agencies hope to persuade more local communities of the benefits of tourism and the value of conserving the protected areas as a means of attracting visitors.

Opinions on the impact of these initiatives are, however, divided. Scheyvens (2002) provides a broadly positive reading noting, for example, how controlled harvesting of resources such as reeds and wood fuel have been introduced in several parks and how communities in close proximity to entry points to parks have been able to develop small-scale tourist enterprises around the sale of craft goods. She also maps over 160 community projects and notes – as a positive development – moves to involve tribal representatives on park management boards. In contrast, Brennan and Allen (2001: 218) offer a much less optimistic view, concluding that ‘in KwaZulu-Natal, parks and other protected areas are painful reminders of apartheid’s injustices, and of the continuing privilege of whites who enjoy looking at wildlife while Africans suffer from land starvation. Community-based ecotourism has achieved little in securing the protected areas for the future, and divided rural communities have few grounds for optimism over plans of the conservation sector.’

Sources: Brennan and Allen (2001); Scheyvens (2002)

According to Page and Dowling (2002), ecotourism has become one of the fastest growing sectors of the global tourism industry with some WTO estimates suggesting that as much as 20 per cent of the world market is based around ecotourism. Outwardly this estimate appears generous but is probably a consequence of the fact that there are differing forms of ecotourism which reflect the core values mentioned above to varying degrees. For example, Page and Dowling (2002) draw an important distinction between ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ forms of ecotourism:

● Hard ecotourism emphasises intense, personal and prolonged encounters with nature, that generally occur in undisturbed settings and where local communities offer none of the conventional trappings of modern tourism. Participants are usually highly committed environmentalists seeking what Cohen (1979) would categorise as

‘existential’ experience.

● Soft ecotourism centres on short-term exposure to nature where the experience is often one component in a range of tourist activities and experiences, where visits tend to be mediated by guides and facilitated by a higher level of facility provi-sion. Participants in soft forms of ecotourism are less likely to be committed environmentalists.

This subdivision is helpful in developing a critique of ecotourism (and other alternative forms) as an intrinsically sustainable, low impact form of tourism. The concept of ‘soft’

ecotourism, in particular, captures a style of travel that a number of writers have characterised as mass tourism in a different guise (Wheeller, 1994) whilst many of the assumptions about the ethical superiority of ecotourism are often misplaced when it is clearly being deployed as a marketing label to represent traditional tourism products in an outwardly new way.

Butler (1994) has also developed a persuasive critique that many types of alternative tourism – such as ecotourism – simply represent the pioneering stages in new practices of mass recreation – in Butler’s words, ‘the thin end of the wedge’. In this way, alternative tourism becomes a mechanism for constructing new geographies of mass travel and its associated impacts, centred on the exotic and the distant, that whilst initially experimental and low impact in character, develop into larger scale, more organised forms of visiting. Moreover, wherever small-scale forms of ecotourism develop into a larger enterprise, there is a heightened risk that the economic benefits of tourism that may initially accrue locally, will quickly be lost as large-scale travel companies from outside the local area take up the new business opportunities (Page and Dowling, 2002).

But even in the more specialist areas of ‘hard’ ecotourism, it is difficult to escape the conclusion that tourism promotes change and that much of this change is not necessarily beneficial. Wall (1997) sees many forms of ecotourism as instigating change in areas that previously were seldom visited and which thus place new demands on host communities and their environments. Similarly, Butler (1991) argues that it is difficult for even the most low-key forms of ecotourism to avoid creating impact and whilst some writers have noted that ecotourism may promote local identities and pride (Khan, 1997), those forms of ecotourism that involve deep immersion by participants in the places they are visiting means that alternative tourism often penetrates far deeper into the personal lives of residents than the more aloof forms of mass tourism, with similarly enhanced capacities to generate a range of environmental, economic, social and cultural impacts.

These criticisms suggest two important conclusions. First, although alternative forms such as ecotourism outwardly appear as environment-friendly and sustainable, the reality is often rather different. Second, alternative tourism – whilst perhaps embracing many principles of sustainability – does not in itself provide a model for sustainable forms of mass tourism and nor is it a replacement for mass tourism. It lacks the physical capacity, logistics

and organisation to meet the growing levels of demand, it lacks the economic scale that has become so important to many national, regional and local economies, and the style of alter-native tourism fails to match the tastes and preferences of many millions of holidaymakers and travellers worldwide.

So, whilst there are aspects of alternative tourism that certainly provide lessons in how to forge sustainable relationships between tourism and the environment, alternative tourism is not a natural (sustainable) replacement for the supposedly problematic mass forms of travel. Solutions to the problem of sustainability therefore need to be forged within the context of mass tourism, and that suggests that if the symbiotic relationship between tourism and the environment is to be maintained, careful management and planning of tourism development – whether guided by sustainable principles or not – must be a central com-ponent in the future growth of tourism.

Summary

Many forms of tourism are dependent upon the environment to provide both a context and a focus for tourist activity, yet those same activities have a marked capacity to devalue and, occasionally, destroy the environmental resources upon which tourism is based.

Environmental effects of tourism are broadly experienced in impacts upon ecosystems, landscapes and the built environment, although specific impacts vary spatially – reflecting differences in the nature of the places that tourists visit, the levels and intensity of development, and the skills and expertise of resource managers. As the environmental problems associated with tourism have become more apparent, greater attention has been focused upon ways of producing sustainable patterns of development and alternative forms of tourism that produce fewer detrimental effects upon the tourist environment. However, truly sustainable tourism has often proven to be elusive, whilst there are evident risks that alternative tourism, in time, develops into mass forms of travel, with all the attendant problems that such practices tend to produce.

Discussion questions

1 What are the main factors that will lead to spatial variation in the environmental impacts of tourism?

2 Critically assess the value of the concept of sustainable development as an approach to understanding the environmental impacts of tourism.

3 With reference to a tourism destination area of your choosing, identify the range of environmental effects that tourism development has created in the area.

4 In what ways, and with what consequences, may global warming affect international tourism?

5 How far can conceptual tools such as carrying capacity, limits of acceptable change and environmental impact assessment actually help us to create sustainable forms of tourism?

6 Is ecotourism intrinsically sustainable?

Sustainability and alternative tourism

Summary

Discussion questions

Further reading