Sustainable tourism / Responsible tourism
Sustainable tourism is all about making better places for people to live in and also better places for people to visit. Responsible tourism needs operators, governments, tourists, hoteliers, and local people to take responsibility and take action to compose tourism more sustainable. Sustainable in simple terms is synonymous with eco-friendly and will make you understand easily that sustainable tourism is being environmentally conscious and which is the significant segment of being sustainable.
When the term sustainability comes, there are in total three parts which can be considered as the pillars. These pillars include economic, environmental as well as social-cultural. These are important in the same way as the four walls are needed to hold the roof of a house. Tourism has to be sustainable in terms of the above three pillars to be called as sustainable tourism or responsible tourism.
Three pillars to be called as sustainable tourism
As we told you as to be marked as sustainable tourism, there are three crucial pillars which should be there. Let us discuss about these three pillars in detail:
Environmental sustainability
The environment is one of the most important parts of tourism as without the place tourism will not be there. To be environmentally sustainable together, the natural environment like the forest, beaches, as well as waterways, should be preserved. Same as this the built environment like historic buildings along with ruins should also be preserved to be called as responsible tourism. Environmental sustainability is to guarantee that resources in an area can be preserved for the utilization of future generations for both tourist and locals.
Socio-Cultural Sustainability
Since the time when some region or site starts being visited by tourist, there are some social and economic impacts of those visitors on the local community. Local people experience overcrowding and congestion in cities and towns, new values and languages also enter with new people. There are several destinations which even experience an increase in instances of petty crime too. So it is very much important to understand that socio-cultural sustainability is minimizing the negative impacts and to start focusing on the positive part, counting preserving local traditions and promoting cultural exchange. This can be done by involving locals in the tourism industry and to encourage sharing local customs too. By this, locals will see tourism in a positive light and will feel a sense of pride in it.
Economic sustainability
The last and most important pillar of sustainability is this as it revolves around money. It actually means building linkages as well as reducing leakages. It means keeping the money local; it means that not only the community is involved in tourism, but they should also share in terms of financial benefits gleaned from it to encourage them to care regarding the other pillars.
Why is this important to learn sustainable or responsible tourism?
Responsible tourism or sustainable tourism can be achieved when together, hotels, tour operators, locals, governments, and tourists take responsibility for ensuring travel is sustainable. It will the much better place for people to live in and for people to visit. It is very much true that sustainable tourism benefits everyone who are involved in it as everybody involved in it will benefitting from it in one or another way.
Sustainable tourism is of primary importance to our planet as well as its future. It offers benefits which are not only environmental and social but also economic. We should understand that sustainability is not a trend; it is a lifestyle. And investment in sustainable tourism is not only necessary but is also beneficial.