Sustainable tourism: Carrying capacity assessment can be a tool for protecting hilly areas

Subject :Environment

Section: Sustainable development

Context:

Tourism development is a double-edged sword, since it has positive impacts (employment, infrastructure development, revenue generation) as well as negative impacts (water pollution, air pollution, ecosystem degradation, loss of the traditional culture) on the local communities and biotic and abiotic environment, if it is not planned or managed well.

Tourism carrying capacity:

The number of international tourists was 1.46 billion in 2019 and will be more than 1.8 billion in 2030, according to the 2020 statistics of the United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO).
According to UNWTO (1999), tourism carrying capacity is “the maximum number of people that may visit a tourist destination at the same time, without destroying the physical, economic, socio cultural environment and an unacceptable decrease in the quality of visitors satisfaction”.
There are five major components of carrying capacity:

Physical carrying capacity (PCC) is concerned with the maximum number of people at any destination.
Social carrying capacity (SCC) is the perceptual, psychological or behavioral capacity of a place.
Infrastructure carrying capacity (ICC) describes facility capacity as those man-made improvements intended to handle visitors or people’s needs, including parking lots, boat ramps, developed campgrounds, restrooms and administrative personnel.
Environmental carrying capacity (ECC) is the number of tourists or people who can undertake activities on a site without causing degradation of the natural environment.
Economic carrying capacity (ECC) relates to the level of acceptable changes within the local economy of a tourist destination. It is also relating to situations where a resource is simultaneously utilised for outdoor recreation and economic activity.

In the region of Asia and the Pacific, India accounted for 28.23 per cent share of total tourist arrivals in 2021.
Recently, this concept of tourism carrying capacity has received significant attention since the world has faced many tragedies at renowned religious destinations such as Naina Devi temple (2008) and Kedarnath temple (2013) in India and Mecca (2015) in Saudi Arabia.

Sustainable tourism and Ecotourism:

Sustainable tourism is defined by the UN Environment Program and UN World Tourism Organization as “tourism that takes full account of its current and future economic, social and environmental impacts, addressing the needs of visitors, the industry, the environment and host communities.”
Ecotourism is a niche segment of tourism in natural areas. The term emerged in the late 1980s.
- Ecotourism is a sustainable form of 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. It typically occurs in natural areas, and should contribute to the conservation or preservation of such areas.
Responsible Travel is a term referring to the behavior and style of individual travelers. The behaviors align with making a positive impact on the destination rather than negative ones.

Sustainable Tourism and the GSTC Criteria:

GSTC is a USA based independent non-governmental organization that represents a diverse and global membership, including national and provincial governments, leading travel companies, hotels, tour operators, NGO’s, individuals and communities.
The Global Sustainable Tourism Council (GSTC) Criteria serve as the global standards for sustainability in travel and tourism. The Criteria are used for education and awareness-raising. They’re used for policy-making, measurement and evaluation reasons and as a basis for certification.
They are categorized in four pillars: (A) Sustainable management; (B) Socioeconomic impacts; (C) Cultural impacts; (D) Environmental impacts.
There are two sets of Criteria
- GSTC Industry Criteria = relates to the sustainable management of the private sector travel industry, focusing currently on Hotels and Tour Operators.
- GSTC Destination Criteria = relates to sustainable management of Tourism Destinations.