Introduction
Tourism is regarded as one of the biggest industries of the modern world based on the amount of asset, money transacted and capital ownership. However the large infrastructural resources and resources that this industry requires like waste usage, waste management and energy have been having damaging impact on the communities around the facilities and the environment itself.
This is because many tourist facilities have not been implementing good waste management and energy policies. To have arrived at such stage is because the industry has undergone exponential increase in international tourist over the past five decades. This period has seen an increase from 25 million tourists traveling per year in the 1950s to 650 million tourists in 2000s. There are a number of factors that have contributed to the increased consumers of various attractions destinations across the world.
Why Increased Tourism?
Over the two past decades the number of tourists has increased tremendously through it has been declining slowly in the past about seven years because of economic crunch.
There are a number of factors that propelled the growth of tourism and these factors include the improvement of the standards of living in many developed nations, good work polices allowing more time for vacations and handsome allowances as well as entitlement to holidays (Kalish 2001, p. 48). Besides, the cost of travelling has been slightly reduced to encourage travelling where holiday destinations and tourism companies package their services into affordable packages.
Consequently, tourism became a very viable export for many developing nations and about one third of the developing nations have tourism as their main export product (Kalish 2001, p. 48). Domestic tourism statistics are not well documented or recorded in many of these developing nations but the domestic tourism in Latin America and Asia has been shown to be increasing equally fast.
Implication of Tourism on Climate and Environment
Natural environment forms the most important resource in tourism industry. Considering the increasing urbanization, tourist destinations in the developing nations and developed nations and having a bigger number of natural features, biodiversity, natural scenery, and cultural heritage as main attractions (Viner & Nicholls 2006, p. 42).
Because, scientist have indicated that energy use causes emissions that affect environment, and that the waste management is poor also contributing to environmental degradation, there have been efforts to try and preserve as well as enhance the natural environment in these tourist destination (Kalish 2001, p. 49). This means that the needs to be increased and high spirited endeavor to preserve environment by government agencies.
Despite the fact that, many people are aware of the amount of damage these activities are having on the environment, governments still move with laxity in implementing regulatory means. The environments where there have been very little human activities are now becoming the most vulnerable environments (Mowforth & Muntsd 2003, p. 94).
For instance, coastal areas, mountains, islands, deserts and wetlands all which form the most popular tourist attractions today. These also fall under the most fragile ecosystems in the world because of the way they are designed.
Their biophysical characteristics are susceptible hence making them prone to damage by human activities like diving at coastal shores. This causes erosion and disposal of liter which sometimes is not properly managed. When a tourist destination is physically degraded, the destination eventually will lose its intrinsic attraction to tourists (Mowforth & Muntsd 2003, p. 94).
Tourists move away to new destinations which could be even more fragile. This has inspire ecotourism or sustainable tourism which is a strategy to practices tourism activities that are self sustaining or are efficient in terms of resource utilization energy and water, waste management and lesser disposal or emission to environment (Becken 2004, p. 337).
The implications of tourism on the environment are many and most of them are negative. Because of tourism activities, the ecosystem and natural biodiversity is in danger. The world life face risk of loss and rare species could become extinct while the natural habitat are destroyed and degraded. The coastal lines are degraded and disrupted (Mowforth & Muntsd 2003, p. 95). Activities like coastal diving, fish spawning, and other marine tourism activities have been seen to have a negative impact on the shoreline.
There is pollution by liter and wastes, the shoreline are slowly eroded away and the coral reefs are lost. Tourism activities are also associated with deforestation around the coast and other forests around. This is experienced when the operators are seeking for wood fuel, timber for construction and clearing areas for their construction of building (Fennell 1999, p. 198). The impact of deforestation is often evident on the soil quality and water, reduced biodiversity and decreased forest products.
The use of the natural resources like water in recreation activities like for swimming pools, use in accommodation and hospitality destinations, uses in golf courses and so on needs a lot of water. The end result is overuse of water and therefore detrimental to environment.
From congestions, transport, use of fossil fuel in cooking and lighting, noise and air pollution because of emissions, the environment is degraded at a very fast rate (Mowforth & Muntsd 2003, p. 95). The global warming phenomenon is exacerbated by increasing tourism activities. Because of water overuse and the fact that fossil fuels are nonrenewable, the industry is considered to be causing serious damage and it is unsustainable and inequitable (Fennell 1999, p. 198).
There still needs to be extensive research on the connection between tourism and impact on the environment. However, there is substantial evidence that tourism has had an impact on the climate change.
Emission Reduction Strategies in Tourism
The word today has to engage in proactive environmental conservation measures and develops strategies to employ in businesses so as to be able to interact positively with the public (Becken 2004, p. 335). Without this, then the danger of the industry becoming a bystander when policies regarding environment and climate are being developed would have great impact on the industry probably collapsing it (Viner & Nicholls 2006, p. 42).
Some climate sustainable strategies or the costs the tourism industry will have to pay include the following:
Responsible Tourism for domestic consumers: the goals of sustainable tourism are to make sure that there is environmental integrity, economic development and social justice even as the tourism industry investors continue to exploit other environments (Fennell 1999, p. 198).
This strategy is informative as tourism are able to learn some new knowledge concerning the destinations they are visit and also how they can contribute in helping the destinations remain sustainable. The residents of the areas in which the tourism facilities are located are taught simple and familiar ways of sustaining their environment which could not make sense to outsiders.
Addressing the impact of transport in tourism is another ways of dealing with the problem of climate change in the modern tourism sector. Research has shown that tourism transport both the outbound and inbound are accountable for up to 8 of the carbon-dioxide emission in European continent alone (Becken 2004, p. 335). Daily revelations concerning the advance and implication of climatic change in relation to transport emissions have been the reason for this fundamentally high profile (Viner & Nicholls 2006, p. 44).
The tourism sector should be able to respond aggressively, promptly and responsible to the challenge of preserving the environment by ensuring lesser emissions. This process of dealing with the environment and climate changes entails carbon-offsetting to the visitors with help of operators and encouraging use of alternative transport (Fennell 1999, p. 199).
Reducing the resource utilization and wastage – sometimes tourism operators seek to exploit new resources and get more fragile environment which are more attractive to clients so as to increase their revenue (Amuleng 2007, p. 285).
Tourism is very significant in the economy of many countries and sometimes it makes extravagant use of the natural resources available. Much of the actions that are necessary for addressing this and related challenges are vested in the process of strengthening environmental management of the tourism sector (Amuleng 2007, p. 285).
Reduction of energy consumption in tourism and encouraging the use of the renewable energy sources and more sophisticated technology as some of the ways suggested for ensuring that tourism activities have very little emissions as much as possible (Viner & Nicholls 2006, p. 45).
The technologies that allow reuse and recycling of the materials being used in the tourism sectors can greatly reduce the need to aggressively exploit new resources that are gradually being depleted. The tourism activities often overuse water and any process that can promote better utilization of water is recommended (Amuleng 2007, p. 285). This includes effective treatment of the sewage and the government should ban the discharge of liquid wastes marine and river environment.
The tourism industry is one of the world’s largest economic sectors that serve people who travel from one place to another just for fun or for recreation while earning host nations some revenue. There is a growing concern on the international scene over issues like global warming, energy crises and climate changes (Gossling 2000, p. 412). This influences personal choices such as travel destination, lengths of journeys and other issues like environmentally friendly services.
Conclusion
To retain international competitiveness, nations are ensuring that they considerably decrease carbon emission and waste management. Currently, the world is faced with serious problems of environmental degradation due to tourism activities like diving tourism or emission from transport. The problems or rather negative implications of tourism are evident in many parts of the world.
For such reasons, there has been a call from international bodies compelling countries to practice tourism that will be self-sustaining so that future generations would be protected and would still have better environment to live in. Sustainable driven tourism is a way for nations to show their commitment to conserving the environment and local traditions while still earning an income and creating job opportunities.
The reason why sustainable tourism is being encouraged all over the world is due to the fact that there is dire need to have positive development. Currently, diving as part of the tourism sector is a booming business. Many nations which have reef lined coasts are making a lot of money from dive tourism activities. However, the problem that is going to affect the economies of such booming business is the mechanical damage that is consequential of these activities.
Reference List
Amuleng, B., 2007. Implications of Global Climate Change For Tourism Flows and Seasonality. Journal of Travel Research, Vol. 45 No. 3, pp. 285-296
Becken, S., 2004. How Tourists and Tourism Experts Perceive Climate Change and Carbon-offsetting Schemes. Journal of Sustainable Tourism, Vol. 12, Issue 4, pp. 332-345
Fennell, D. A., 1999, Ecotourism: An Introduction. Routledge: London
Gossling, S., 2000. Sustainable Tourism Development in Developing Countries: Some Aspects of Energy Use. Journal of Sustainable Tourism, Vol. 8, Issue 5, pp. 410-425
Kalish A., 2001. Tourism as Fair Trade: NGO Perspectives. London: Tourism Concern:
Mowforth, M., & Muntsd, I., 2003, Tourism and Sustainability: Development, Globalization And New Tourism In Third World. London: Taylor And Francis:
Viner, D., & Nicholls, S., 2006, Climate Change and Its Implication for International Tourisms, Tourism Management Dynamics. Oxford: Elsevier Butterworth-Heinemann.