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Nature-based products, ecotourism and adventure tourism
... The increased demand to visit the areas with natural attractions significantly supports nature-based tourism, ecotourism, adventure tourism (NEAT) and attraction-based tourism (Mihalic, 2006; Tirasatayapitak & Laws, 2002). Such hybrid tourism is one of the fastest growing segments of tourism development (Balmford et al., 2009; Bell, Simpson, Tyrvä inen, Sievänen, & Prö bstl, 2009; Karanth & Defries, 2011; Mihalic, 2006; Asia Pacific Journal of Tourism Research, 2014 http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10941665.2013.877045 ...
... The increased demand to visit the areas with natural attractions significantly supports nature-based tourism, ecotourism, adventure tourism (NEAT) and attraction-based tourism (Mihalic, 2006; Tirasatayapitak & Laws, 2002). Such hybrid tourism is one of the fastest growing segments of tourism development (Balmford et al., 2009; Bell, Simpson, Tyrvä inen, Sievänen, & Prö bstl, 2009; Karanth & Defries, 2011; Mihalic, 2006; Asia Pacific Journal of Tourism Research, 2014 http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10941665.2013.877045 ...
... Today they collectively represent 10 – 20% of all international travel (UNWTO, 2009) with northern Europe holding the larger share of nature tourists (MEK, 2009). As a subset of NEAT, waterbased activities, such as rafting (Ghasemi, 2011), have been reported as creating growing environmental awareness and an interest in natural tourism attractions (Mihalic, 2006). In many countries, nature-based tourism and ecotourism often takes place in national parks or protected areas (Fredman & Sandell, 2009; Fredman & Tyrvä inen, 2010). ...
The paper reports a study from Southern Thailand where white water rafting (WWR) has produced significant community development benefits to Ban Songpraek Village; yet the future is challenging. This study investigates the origins, growth and management of the WWR enterprises and the perceived impacts of tourism on the village. Using qualitative and quantitative methods the results show a complex situation as tourism benefits accrued to the village and the residents' response to these benefits creates dependency. The village is a rear example of partial empowerment of the indigenous community yet to achieve sustainability; the study suggests that villages need to be further empowered to determine the preferred level of tourism growth in the village. To achieve this, the integration of WWR tourism with other resource-based activities and the regulation of the tourism activities is required.
... There is a broad agreement that the natural environment plays an important role in adventure tourism (Giddy & Webb, 2018). Although adventure tourism involves the use of natural resources, it refers to activities that are more challenging than general nature-based tourism (Mihalic, 2006). In professional literature as well as in the media, ballooning is represented as an outdoor recreation activity (Cloke & Perkins, 2002;McKay, 2013). ...
Hot air ballooning as a niche outdoor activity has become popular in the Czech Republic in the last two decades. It provides not only authentic experiences but also a feeling of intense excitement. This research note aims to report on the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic on balloon tourism. It presents initial results on new ideas regarding opportunities and threats to ballooning in the Czech Republic arising during the coronavirus outbreak. Several methods were used, combining desk research with qualitative in-depth interviews with main balloon flights operators. Despite many unfavourable circumstances, the pandemic situation brought several opportunities for this business stemming from the government measures and shifts in travellers' behaviour. These opportunities include, for example, the focus on domestic clientele looking for different experiences under pandemic conditions and the strategic cooperation of balloon flights operators with accommodation providers.
... Our focus is on nature-based adventure tourism (Buckley, 2006(Buckley, , 2010Mihalic, 2006;Rokenes et al., 2015;Beams et al., 2019) to foreground the sustainability aspects of commercialized nature tourist experiences that "often involve[e] perceived risk or controlled danger associated with personal challenges" (Mihalic, 2006, p. 114). Adventure tourism and nature-based tourism are closely related with some overlap in practice. ...
This paper investigates how tourists and guides perform sustainability during adventure tourism trips in natural environments. The paper draws on empirical data from an ethnographic study of five different multi-day trips in Norway, each of which used skiing, hiking, or biking as the mode of travel. In our analysis, we focus on how the different actors understood, operationalized and practiced elements of sustainability in their everyday lives while on the trips. The paper applies a micro-sociological perspective to the nature-based adventure tourism scene where the interplay between tourists, guides, adventure activities and nature is understood as multiple dialectic performances co-produced by the different actors. Goffman's dramaturgical metaphors, and concepts of frames, appearance, and manner saturate recent research on tourism and nature guiding. This paper builds on the “performance turn” as a theoretical point of departure for understanding sustainability in nature-based adventure tourism experiences. In participant observations and post-trip interviews with Norwegian and international tourists and their guides, we found that sustainability performances were not a major aspect of the trips. We did find some performances of mainly “light” sustainability and, among them, elements of ambivalence and ambiguity. Our data indicate that some guides tread a fine line between enhancing and deepening tourists' experiences of nature and sustainability or negatively impacting the perceived enjoyment imperative of the trip. International tourists expressed deeper sustainability overall. We reflect on the relative explanatory strengths of Goffman's “frames” and interaction order, and Persson's “framing,” for understanding the interplay between guide and tourist sustainability performances and conclude with pointers for teasing out the complexities we identify.
... Another proposed way of bringing sustainable development together with existing forms of tourism involves considering the hierarchical structure of the evaluation process in relation to protected areas by prioritizing different elements within the same structure (Deng, King & Bauer, 2002;Dorobantu, 2012). The identical conclusion is also found in other studies devoted to natural based tourism forms: mountain tourism, ecotourism and adventure tourism (Mihalic, 2006;Kuscer, 2012). ...
The problem of adequate management of natural resources by management organizations represents a major obstacle in introducing changes to the destination system, as well as to the long-term sustainability and renewability of competitive destinations. The main objective of this study is to examine connections and relations between the established systems of criterion variables by using multiple regression analysis. The study was conducted over 55 Montenegrin tour operators, involved in the process of distributing different types of selective tourist arrangements, by evaluating the items of five specially designed assessment indicators. Based on the analysis's results, it has been confirmed that the selected indicator system can be an effective means of representing and applying the proposed assessment model. The findings of the study show that the commercial-economic interests of entities surveyed slightly exceed the concept of destination sustainability, negating on this way the systemic contribution and significance of the competitive indicators estimated. The limitations of the study relate to the certain homogeneity of results obtained, taking into account the available research sample's size. By adopting the proposed assessment model, establishing a basic conceptual platform for the practical application of appropriate development standards and indicators of the competitive tourist destination is encouraged.
... Nature-based tourism is defined mainly as tourism within natural environments [46], whereas ecotourism is institutionally defined as "responsible travel to natural areas that conserves the environment, sustains the well-being of the local people, and involves interpretation and education" (www.ecotourism.org). The tourism research community seems aware of this distinction, with a lot of literature attempting to define what ecotourism is [47,48] or the role of nature in nature-based tourism [49,50], while the ESF uses both terms indistinctly, especially in addressing (eco)tourism as a cultural service. Moreover, the ESF assumes ecotourism to be a form of recreation in many of its statements. ...
The Ecosystem Services Framework (ESF) is a powerful tool for understanding the relationship between nature and society, and tourism is an important expression of this. However, the scientific literature focusing on the relationship between tourism and the ESF is limited. Hence, there is a need to bring the tourism research community and the ESF together, not only as a cultural service but as an economic sector that consumes natural resources. This paper aims to do this by analyzing discourse on tourism in institutional reports produced by the ESF. Additionally, how the tourism research community has approached the ESF is analyzed by reviewing the literature that has used it and literature addressing nature-based tourism. The results suggest a “schizophrenic” approach to tourism, which is defined as either a cultural ES (nonmaterial) or as a nature-based industry (consumptive). Moreover, a disconnect has been found between tourism research and the ESF. The tourism research community may not feel comfortable with the inaccurate definition of tourism in the ESF and may prefer to use freer terms. However, the aforementioned community should integrate the ESF within their studies on natural resources. At the same time, the ESF should be more accurate in using tourism-related concepts.
This paper aims to frame nature tourism within the multifunctionality of peri-urban natural areas, based on empirical research on three habitat management territories with specific conservation goals. This analysis justified the application of an original survey among visitors and semi-structured interviews with management stakeholders with direct or indirect responsibilities in these territories. The results reinforce the importance of adequate governance structures that include various features of pressure and enhancement in the territory, surpassing the current barriers of nature tourism management in the region. A conceptual model is presented, suggesting the development of Territorial Application Units under the effective governance of the national conservation body, as an approach towards proximity and adaptive management policies. Contributions are made in terms of valuing responsible nature tourism in peri-urban conservation strategies, emphasizing new advantages beyond the typically economistic vision.
Despite numerous attempts at operationalising ecotourism, none have explicitly incorporated the three tenets of ecotourism (i.e. nature, education, and sustainability) into scale development with the purpose of identifying ecotourists from non-ecotourists. Therefore, we used a combination of Churchill and Rossiter’s scale development frameworks to create the Ecotourist Identification Scale (EIS) as a tool for identifying ecotourists based on these three criteria. We split a sample of 786 U.S. travellers in half to perform a Principal Components Analysis for scale purification on one half followed by a Confirmatory Factor Analysis on the other. Results of the Confirmatory Factor Analysis indicated strong construct reliability for each component of the EIS based on factor loadings above 0.50, reliability coefficients exceeding 0.70, and Average Variance Explained above 50%. Furthermore, we employed Structural Equation Modeling to explore which aspects of ecotourism’s three tenets influence intention to engage in ecotourism by testing the relationship between EIS scale components and ecotourism intention. Results indicate interest in nature and environmental sustainability are significantly related to ecotourism intention while interest in education, socio-cultural sustainability, and economic sustainability are not, indicating discrepancies between the academic definition of ecotourism and the factors driving tourists to engage in ecotourism.
The doctoral thesis deals with the role that sustainability plays in the modern practice of destination governance in the alpine and dinaric mountain destinations. In that sense, a comparison is first made regrading the implementation of sustainability in the process of destination governance by destination management organizations (DMO) in the Alps and in the Dinarides. Through a questionnaire, quantitative data was collected that was used to analyze the differences in the two regions regarding the implementation of sustainability principles in planning the destination, leadership/management styles in the destination governance/management, destination development priorities, as well as the importance given to the different types of stakeholders. After that, a comparison is made regarding the two most developed mountain destinations in the Republic of Serbia, Kopaonik and Zlatibor, using the integrated framework for indicators of sustainable tourism. This way, shortcomings where identified, and suggestions were given for improvements in both destinations. Finally, using an interview methodology, a deeper research is made into the ways and available means for implementation of sustainable tourism in the German Alps, as an example of an alpine region whose experiences can be used in the development of the mountain tourism in the region of the Dinarides. We discussed the following subjects with the interviewees: strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats in the destination; sustainability as well as projects initiatives and plans related to sustainability; the most important stakeholders of sustainable tourism, natural resources and their protection; indicators of sustainable development; and cross-border cooperation, while the subject of ecotourism spontaneously emerged as an important subject during the interviews.
This paper proposes a seven tiered taxonomy of tourism products in an effort to add some structure to the vast array of offerings available today. The paper adopts a phenetic method to group products hierarchically, using a modified version of the marketing-oriented product hierarchy system. Five broad Need Families are identified including: Pleasure, Personal Quest, Human Endeavour, Nature and Business. They incorporate 27 Product Families and 90 Product Classes.
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