National Geographic asked their readers if some places should be off-limits to tourists. Responses varied but most experts agreed that locking places away from people is not the answer. Tourism is crucial to the preservation of many wild places and the focus should instead be on how travel can be used as a tool to solve these global problems.
In this “Good Tourism” Insight, Edwin Magio calls upon African travel & tourism stakeholders to put their words into action. Given that communities and conservation efforts are heavily reliant on tourism and have been adversely affected by tourism’s pause during COVID-19, it is important to ensure that they are at the centre of tourism’s post-pandemic recovery efforts.
The guidelines, developed by a team of international experts, aim to help national stakeholders, protected area managers and researchers count visitation and measure economic impacts consistently through a standardised approach.
The costs of the pandemic and restrictions on economies, livelihoods and the environment have been very high. This article focusing on the example of Nepal suggests that recovery needs to achieve the dual goals of economic revival and ecosystem restoration. Here, investments in forestry and nature-based tourism can help.
After almost all the coral was destroyed due to tourist traffic, Thailand had to close down its famous cove, Maya Bay. Dive teams have now planted 20,000 coral fragments in the bay to help rehabilitate the reef. When the bay will open again will be uncertain, but it will be a different experience than it was before.
