Narelle Beaumont’s research while affiliated with University of Southern Queensland and other places

While environmental and social research have generated a large amount of information and data on how values and environmental ethics relate to sustainable development, there are no studies that examine the missing links reflected in the terminology of the sustainable development definition that alienates it from its ecological ethos. This paper reviews the concept of sustainable development that continues to remain vague even two decades after the Brundtland Commission report. It then examines the limitations in the contemporary anthropocentric conceptualization of sustainable development with a utilitarian ethic and argues for a more ecocentric reinterpretation of its definition that is more inclusive and incorporates recognition of the socio-ecological values. The paper concludes with a call for a revised global resolution and a framework for sustainable development based on its reinterpretation that recognizes the interdependence of humans with the rest of the ecosphere. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment

This paper presents survey results on tourism operator preferences and motivations for carbon offset options by environmentally certified tourism enterprises in Queensland, Australia. It found that less than a third are involved in carbon offset programmes, whereas just over a third plan to implement offsetting in the near future. Preferred offset projects are regional tree planting or renewable energy. Motivations for offsetting are related to environmental concern, commercial benefits of climate-friendly tourism, and financially supporting offset projects. This study found motivations for offsetting by larger tourism enterprises aligning with the more general business motivations and drivers for adopting corporate social and environmental responsibility practices. However, the extra cost and uncertainty about carbon issues limited the uptake of offsetting by smaller tourism operators.

Tourism is susceptible to the impacts of climate change on destinations and businesses, but also contributes to the causes of climate change via greenhouse gas emissions from travel. This article reports on carbon mitigation actions by environmentally certified tourism enterprises in Queensland, Australia. The survey results profile attitudes to climate change, emissions auditing, carbon mitigation actions, and motives for emissions reduction. The study revealed that most operators believed climate change was an important issue for tourism and had implemented a range of carbon mitigation actions in energy, water, and waste reduction. The most popular actions were energy efficiency and reducing energy use, while less popular measures were adopting renewable energy and carbon offsetting. Tourism operators preferred lower cost actions that were easy to implement and would provide cost savings. The key motives for tourism operators implementing these carbon actions related to ecological responsibility and business competitiveness via cost savings and differentiating their business as “climate friendly.” These motivations align with general business principles driving the implementation of socially and environmentally responsible practices by companies. The findings suggest that environmentally certified tourism enterprises now consider emissions reduction measures to be an integral part of sustainable tourism development.

In protected areas, local communities’ participation is considered central to put the sustainable tourism process in place. This paper explored the community capacity for sustainable tourism in Central Karakoram National Park, Pakistan. The purpose of this paper was to assess the perceptions of buffer zone local communities’ about their capacity to engage in sustainable tourism development using a survey instrument specifically designed for this study. The findings revealed five dimensions of community capacity as perceived by the local communities: participatory development skills, community sense of ownership, socio-economic opportunities; decision-making and social-ecological empowerment. It appeared that the level of community capacity and opportunities for local communities in tourism development were low. Concerned leaders, especially protected area authorities, could utilize the results of this study to facilitate the enhancement of community capacity for protected area sustainable tourism.

Sustainable tourism has been widely viewed as an effective way of addressing the socio-economic and environmental issues associated with protected areas, particularly alpine protected areas which are popular destinations, providing opportunities for adventure tourism with close-to-nature experiences. Nevertheless, the impact of tourism is controversial and its sustainability is not always evident both in terms of socio-economic development and nature conservation. This paper assesses the level of understanding of multiple stakeholders about sustainable tourism in the Central Karakoram National Park (CKNP), located in Pakistan’s peripheral province of Gilgit-Baltistan, where nature tourism is considered to be the most promising activity to overcome livelihood and conservation problems. Data were collected from four stakeholder groups using a previously structured survey instrument about their level of understanding of sustainable tourism while semi-structured interviews were conducted about the barriers to achieving sustainable tourism. The findings disclosed that although stakeholders had a moderately high level of understanding of sustainable tourism, the main obstacles and challenges that underpinned sustainable tourism development in CKNP were acute fragmentation between public and private entities, absence of a participatory governance structure, and a lack of tourism management plan for CKNP’s potential future as a destination for sustainable tourism. Implications are discussed for building a more integrated policy approach to sustainable tourism development in protected areas.

There is a growing body of knowledge about the impacts of climate change on tourism destinations and about tourism’s commitment to address these impacts. However, there has been limited research about climate change responses by national or sub-national tourism agencies and the role they play in providing information, incentives and leadership to encourage the uptake of climate change actions by the industry. This paper assesses the climate change responses of nine Australian government tourism agencies. Information on climate change, sustainability and green business practices is drawn from the corporate websites, annual reports, tourism plans, fact sheets, and case studies produced by one national, six state and two territory tourism agencies from 2007 to 2010. The paper focuses on how government tourism agencies are addressing climate change mitigation by promoting carbon reduction initiatives and carbon offsetting schemes. Climate change tourism responses are more developed in Australian states with climate change policies and in destinations vulnerable to the impacts of climate change or dependent on long haul travellers. To date, few government tourism agencies report on their own carbon footprint or mitigation and offset measures. This study highlights a range of mitigation options that will assist government tourism agencies to address climate change impacts through policies, strategic plans and green business advice for tourism operators.

Protected areas (PAs) are set aside as representative areas to maintain ecological processes, genetic potential and environmental services. They also serve as tourist attractions and are sources of livelihoods for local communities in the developing countries. However, with the negative socio-environmental consequences of tourism there is a growing recognition of the need for sustainable approaches to tourism management in the PAs. While tourism has been acknowledged as a tool for conservation and for creating local livelihoods, it is widely debated that conflicting interests of multiple stakeholder groups can hinder tourism in achieving these social and environmental objectives. For transformational change in tourism management based on corporate socio-ecological responsibility, we identify key stakeholder-related factors that influence stakeholders’ participation and the domains where the integration takes place in tourism research. We further identify various organizational management models that have the potential to reduce conflicts, and to produce sustainable outcomes for tourism in PA destinations. This integrated approach to tourism research combines planning and management tools applied in these models to provide a holistic and collaborative tourism management system. We expect that this conceptual framework for PAs underscores social, economic and environmental sustainability.

Ecotourism can be defined by three core criteria: nature, learning and sustainability. The ecotourist market has been segmented by the nature and learning criteria only. It has been assumed that ecotourists are environmentally concerned and therefore sustainability is a factor in their decision-making. However, little empirical research has confirmed this assumption. This study surveyed 243 respondents participating in an ecotourism experience in Australia. It identified ecotourists according to the nature and learning criteria as per previous segmentation studies. Pro-environmental attitudes were measured as an indication of their support for sustainability. Results revealed no significant differences in pro-environmental attitudes between those identified as ecotourists and those considered non-ecotourists. While demand exists for nature and learning experiences, compliance with the sustainability criterion seems to be no more a factor in ecotourist decision-making than for mainstream tourists. Implications are that market segmentation research should consider all relevant criteria when segmenting a market for a particular product to ensure supply matches demand. However, demand for certain products can be created by innovative marketing practices. This would enable the ecotourism industry to respond to the market's demand for nature and learning, but also influence the behaviour and structure of the market with regard to sustainability.