Category: Community-based tourism

Achieving Collaboration in Västerbotten – A Swedish Tale 

After the Västerbotten regional tourism authority developed its sustainable tourism initiative, it then faced the hurdle of how to get stakeholders on board. Annika Sandstrom, Region Tourism Chief, explains how they not only overcame this challenge, but also encouraged other destinations in the county to commit to better destination stewardship.  Västerbotten Brings

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A Himalayan Village Takes Charge of Its Future

After witnessing unprecedented environmental damage, and despite pressure from tourism investors, the Indian village of Sharchi put regulations in place to limit unbridled growth in its attractive Himalayan valley. Aditi Chanchani and Sandeeep Minhas detail how the valley’s village councils are coming together to protect the region’s nature, culture, and

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Contrasting Tourism Landscapes in Karnataka, India

The pandemic exposed the dangers of ‘tourism monocultures’ – dependence on one product only – versus a more holistic approach to tourism fare. Gayathri Hegde has been researching the differing tourism experiences of Dandeli and Joida, neighboring towns in Karnataka, southwestern India. River Rafting Alone Does Not a Destination Make

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Resurrected Matera Faces Overtourism

Inviting Hollywood into your home can backfire badly. Often, a roaring success on the screen may cause instant, irreversible collateral damage to the destination, its culture and citizens. Arild Molstad explores the too-much, too-fast story of Italy’s ancient, now-restored town of Matera.   Once Called “the Shame of Italy,” Matera Grapples with

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Human Encounters

Lessons from the pandemic have revealed how stronger rural communities can make for stronger cross-cultural touring, say Ann Becker and Jorge Moller Rivas. They propose a framework for doing so. Pandemic Insights Suggest a Course for the Future As long-time travel leaders, we joined forces in 2019 to create and

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Neolocalism and Tourism

Much tourism depends on distinctive sense of place, but market forces often favour lookalike franchises over more distinctive local businesses. Dr. Christina Cavaliere has co-edited a new multi-author book that makes the case for neolocalism, a movement through which businesses can help destinations retain and deepen their identities, and which also supports Covid

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The Maya Riviera’s Queen of Green

Mexican activist Beatriz Barreal has worked for years to steer the booming Riviera Maya toward sustainability. Purdue’s Dr. Jonathon Day recently interviewed this local one-woman force for improving stewardship to find out what lessons she has learned in the process. Meet Beatriz Barreal For more than a decade, Beatriz Barreal Danel has

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Doing It Better: ≠Khoadi-//Hôas, Namibia

Namibia’s award-winning ≠Khoadi-//Hôas conservancy has often been cited as a success story in both conservation and community benefit. Destination Stewardship Report editor Jonathan Tourtellot takes a tourist-eye view of this community-run destination – part of our ongoing project to profile places with an effective method for holistic management in the

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A Taiwanese Island Boosts Tourist Capacity – Sustainably

[Above, Turtle Island in profile. Photo: Roi Ariel] For 20 years, ecotourists have been eager to tour a biodiverse volcanic island off the coast of Taiwan. But what happens when both locals and tourists complain about the stringent conservation limits on visitation set by government and academics? Monique Chen explains

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Doing It Better: Columbia Gorge

The Search for Holistic Destination Management In our last DSR issue, we discussed the importance of GSTC Destination Criterion A1, which reads in part: “The destination has an effective organization, department, group, or committee responsible for a coordinated approach to sustainable tourism, . . . for the management of environmental,

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