Write a case study of a contemporary ecotourism issue in which you Essay

Write a case study of a contemporary ecotourism issue in which you integrate aspects of theory and practice from a wide range of material - Essay Example In the third section I will give examples of elements that threaten to saturate the carrying capacity of nature based tourism in Kenya. In the fourth and final section I will give a brief historical account of ecotourisms presence in Kenya and give ways in which it can be a possible source of sustainable development in the future. Part 1: What does sustainable development really mean? The most common definition of sustainable development is: development which meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs (World Commission on Environment and Development, 1987).ï ¾ µ In essence, for sustainable development to occur there must be some sort of trade-off between the aspirations of the present and those of the future. Successful management of resources is the cornerstone of sustainable development. Creating sustainable development is especially important to nature based tourism because it completely relies on an ecological re source that is usually non-renewable and irreplaceable. Once the environmental resource has developed past the point where it is no longer attractive to perspective tourist the entire economy of the dependent host community will collapse. The maximum amount of positive development that can occur is determined by the carrying capacity. The carrying capacity is the saturation point where anymore development will result in the degeneration of future resources. All nature-based tourism locations have limited ecological, aesthetic, and social carrying capacities. The ecological carrying capacity is reached when the number of visitors starts to have a negative impact on the wildlife and environment (Whelan, p. 11.). The aesthetic carrying capacity is reached when tourists encounter so many other tourists that the intrinsic value of the beauty of the environment is marred (Whelan, p. 11). The social carrying capacity is reached when the number of tourist in relation to the host population