Ecotourism: what it is, the advantages and the disadvantages

Hi Everyone!

Today we wanted to talk about the idea of ecotourism, including the advantages and disadvantages of this concept. If you are looking to reduce your environmental and social impact when travelling, then this is the post for you!

Ecotourism is a form of tourism which limits the damage to the environment and local community. It can involve helping in community projects such as planting trees, as well as taking part in local customs and festivals. It helps to keep the local culture alive, while preserving the natural environment.

The advantages are abundant. By helping in a project conserving the environment, tourists gain a new understanding and appreciation for the natural world and may be inspired to make changes in their "real" life to live more sustainably. It provides a valuable insight to a country and community, perhaps also inspiring more respect for different people and the lives they lead. The projects also provide sustainable income sources for locals, helping the economy.

This form of income is also important as it does not rely on deforestation. Deforestation provides the area for people to grow crops and farm cattle. This is obviously detrimental to the environment, not only because of the land use of farming cattle, but also as it clears the trees, which act as carbon sinks, removing the carbon dioxide from the atmosphere through photosynthesis.

However, there are several disadvantages to ecotourism. For example, tourism in some areas is not sustainable year round, due to the extreme climate. Many tourists wouldn't want to visit a hurricane prone area in the hurricane season for example. This means the locals may need to find another means of income at certain times of the year.

Another huge disadvantage is that tourists still need to get to a region offering ecotourism. This most likely involves flying, which is extremely bad in terms of greenhouse gas emissions. Therefore this form of tourism definitely doesn't solve the entirety of the question of sustainable tourism.

Ecotourism is still a very new concept, and to many getting their hands dirty and participating in conservation projects isn't quite the holiday they imagined, at least compared to lounging on a beach in the sun! However, I believe the advantages of the cultural discoveries and first-hand experience of local customs means these are such incredible projects to be part of.

There are several sites that now offer ecotourism. I have actually done a topic on this at school, and we did a case study about Santa Lucia, in Ecuador. This is an amazing project, which you can find out more about here!

Thank you so much for taking the time out of your day to read this post, and we hope it has been interesting! Let us know in the comments what you think about ecotourism and if it's something you would consider taking part in!

Your Green World Blog Team💚

Comments

Photo Essay || Iceland Series (part 1)

Hi Everyone! I recently went on a school trip to Iceland! It was such an incredible experience (and I'm going to sound cheesy now) but it was also incredible to do it with some of my closest friends! I saw so many incredible things and learnt so much, so I couldn't resist sharing a little Iceland mini series of posts, all about Iceland, both my experiences there and what I saw, but also the way it uses geothermal energy, and the animals, natural landforms and plants that are there. Today I'm sharing some photos of my trip. These are all photos I have taken, and are also the highlights so please bear that in mind as you browse these! I hope it is interesting and inspires you to book a trip to Iceland! The blue lagoon <33 landscapes.... Lost little farmhouses a...

Carbon credits

Hi everyone, Welcome back to Green World! Today we're talking about an industry that has expanded massively in the past few years. Carbon credits are one of the measures that companies are taking to reduce CO2 emissions . But how does it actually work? The companies that sell carbon credits fund projects to protect an area of forest or rainforest from deforestation . They then calculate how much carbon dioxide emissions they have saves by protecting this area. This means they can now sell 'negative carbon emissions' to companies. In this way, the companies are funding the protection of said area and are causing negative emissions while doing so meaning that the company can still emit greenhouse gases but can claim to be net zero. One carbon credit is basically the permission to emit one ton of CO2. This is good for the company as well as they are able to advertise as sustainable at a relatively low cost to actually reducing the...

October 2021 Factfile | news, animals and more!

Hello, October is over and November is here - let's hope it's a cosy month full of stunning Autumn colours and beautiful rainy days! News Good news Judge postpones wolf hunt in Wisconsin Every year in Wisconsin there is a wolf hunt in autumn. But this year, something amazing happened: A judge halted the season. For years there has been a dispute, on one side environmentalists, and on the other hunters and farmers. The farmers claim that wolves destroy their crops and that killing them is the only solution. Environmentalists argue that wolf populations are too weak and that the animals shouldn't be killed. Let's hope that this is the first step toward stopping the wolf hunt altogether. Bad news Pacific islands are disappearing For many of us, the threat of climate change feels distant. But for the people of the Pacific islands, the terror is all too real. These are their homes, and they are rapidly becoming submerged b...

Jane Goodall

Born: 1934 When Jane was a little girl, she loved climbing trees and reading books. She dreamed that she could go to Africa and see the wild animals there. So Jane flew to Tanzania determined to study chimpanzees in their natural habitat. When she first arrived, none of the chimpanzees would let her get near them. They would always run away at first sight. Jane kept coming back until they let her come closer. However, Jane wanted to become friends with the chimpanzees. So she started the "banana club" which meant that she would share bananas with them every time she visited the chimpanzees. She discovered that chimpanzees have rituals, that they use tools, that their language comprises at least twenty sounds and that they are not vegetarians. Once she rescued an injured chimpanzee and nursed it back to health. When she released it back into the wild, the chimpanzee turned around and hugged her as if to say, "thank you and goodby...

Coral reefs

Hello! We would love to introduce you to the topic of coral reefs and especially coral reef bleaching, as it is a greatly ignored but certainly significant topic. Have fun! 5 coral reef facts 1. The Great Barrier Reef is the largest living structure on the planet and is 2300 km long! 2. Less than 0.1% of the world's ocean surface is covered in coral reefs. 3. At least 25% of all marine animals live there. 4. Coral reefs are often known as the rainforests of the ocean. 5. In 1 square kilometre of coral reef, up to 35 tons of fish can be 'produced'. The 5 biggest coral reefs in the world 1. Great Barrier Reef (near Australia) 2. Red Sea Coral Reef (near Egypt, Israel and Djibouti) 3. New Caledonia Reef (Pacific Ocean near New Caledonia) 4. The Mesoamerican Barrier Reef (near Mexico, Belize, Guatemala and Honduras) 5. Florida Reef (Atlantic Ocean/Gulf of Mexico near Florida) What is coral? Coral is actually made up of small anim...

Climate change: what is it and what's the problem

Hello, I've noticed that we are always mentioning climate change. Not only us blog editors but also politicians, activists and so on. The words climate change are bounced around in the media and probably in your households, but do you actually know what it is or how it works? I know that for a long time, I didn't know what it really meant. I hope that this post changes that. What is climate change and how does it work? The words climate change describe a slow shift in the earth's temperature and changes in the weather patterns. Having a single warm winter does not instantly mean climate change. Climate change happens over a long period of time. If you look at a temperature graph over the years, it doesn't go up in one day and then stay the same for another hundred years. It curves up slowly but steadily. This is a average temperature graph from 1880 to just after 2000. You can see how the temperature gradually gets warmer....

Energy comparison: solar (PV) panels

Hi everyone, Today I'm looking into the first on a long list of energy sources: solar (PV) panels. Are they actually sustainable and could they become our main energy source in the near future? After all, enough energy from the sun reaches the earth in 90 minutes to cover the entire world's energy consumption for a whole year! How they work There are a couple of ways to transform energy from the sun into electricity. The one we are looking at today is solar panels also known as solar photovoltaic technology. Photovoltaic (PV) technology is the key to solar panels. A solar panel is made of many PV cells. A single PV cell will produce 1-2 watts of power. They are very thin and are normally protected by glass and/or plastics. This is the best explanation I could find (click here for the source): When the semiconductor is exposed to light, it absorbs the light’s energy and transfers it to negatively charged particles in the material calle...

30.08.2020 Animal of the week: Whale Shark

Hi! It is International Whale Shark Day today, so we thought, we would do this week's animal of the week about whale sharks. Are whale sharks, sharks or whales? Whale sharks are not whales and they aren't a mix of whale and shark. They are sharks. So, why are they called whale sharks if they aren't whales? Well, they are very big. Whale sharks normally grow to a length of 5.5-10 metres. However, the largest whale shark to be accurately measured was 18.8 metres long! That is about as long as a lorry or as high as a short oak tree. Basically, whale sharks are massive. Habitat and Diet Whale sharks prefer warmer waters. They live in all tropical seas. Every spring, they are known to migrate to the continental shelf of the central west coast of Australia. The whale shark is one of the three known filter-feeding shark species in the world. Like whales, they eat plankton. Images: Image 1: This image is o...

Sir David Attenborough - an incredible naturalist

Hi everyone and welcome back to Green World, Today we want to talk about one of the most inspiring naturalists of our time. It is, of course, David Attenborough. Today (08.05.2021) is his 95th birthday so we seemed it fitting to publish a post about him today. Over his lifetime, David has won more than 40 awards for his work and was named among the 100 greatest Britons in 2020. David first joined the BBC in 1952 as a producer for the Talks department which looked after all non-fiction broadcasts. Since then, he has worked on lots of different programs and documentaries such as The Life Series, which was first made in 1979. More recently, he has presented Blue Planet and Blue Planet II. The latter had the most views recorded for a single program in 2017. David also gave the Royal Institution's Christmas Lecture in 1973 on The Language of the Animals. David Attenborough is still presenting documentaries to this day. He now lives in Richmo...

How much do you know about extinction? | quiz

Hi Everyone! Welcome back to the blog! This week is our last monthly quiz! We'd love to hear which one was your favourite in the comments! We also have a quick online survey for what our monthly post should be next year. We really appreciate any feedback and this is the best way for you to tell us what you want to see us post about and share! From a monthly challenge to an environmental book of the month - we just want to know what you think! 🍂 click here to vote! So, how much do you know about extinction? You may know some from our " animals you don't know are on the edge of extinction " series, or from the news as extinction is such a buzzword. All of these facts are from reliable sources such as National Geographic, as well as the statistics being cross checked with other websites. 1. How many years ago was the most recent mass extinction? a) 44 million b) 55 million c) 66 million 2. How many species could be threatened ...

Green World

Search This Blog