ITMEMS 1998 Proceedings - Case Studies

Session 6 - Tourism and Protected Areas

The GEF Egyptian Red Sea Coastal and Marine Resource Management Project — A Decade Of Effort, Experience and Trade-Offs Required to Achieve Marine Tourism and Conservation Goals [Adobe Acrobat Format 81 Kb]

This paper presents a case study of the ‘Egyptian Red Sea Coastal and Marine Resource Management Project’. The project is supported by the Global Environment Facility (GEF) through the World Bank. It aims to address coastal-marine related tourism and conservation linkages of the Egyptian Red Sea through integrated approaches to coastal-marine resource management, coupled with innovative partnerships of the three lead agencies in the coastal arena: the Red Sea Governorate, the Tourism Development Authority and the Egyptian Environment Affairs Agency. This ITMEMS case study first presents the overall setting, rationale and objectives of the Egyptian GEF project. These set the stage for the original project design in the early 1990s. It is followed by a summary review of the key outputs and results from project implementation largely realised during the past two years. Although the overall Egyptian Red Sea project is framed around an integrated coastal zone management (ICZM) context, this case study highlights the project’s emphasis on linkages between tourism and coastal-marine protected areas (CMPAs) and respective national and international strategic initiatives which co-evolved throughout this decade. The case study concludes with perspectives and lessons learned from this project that are relevant to the core themes of ICRI, including aspects of: integrated management, capacity building, research and monitoring, and review elements. This paper is based on core reports published through the GEF Project as described in the text, and impressions from the author who consulted on the
project throughout its duration.

Making Tourism Work for the Bonaire Marine Park [Adobe Acrobat Format 19 Kb]

Bonaire is economically dependent on tourism—primarily dive tourism—and its challenge is to ensure that tourism works for the island. In order to achieve ‘sustainable’ tourism, three aspects need to be considered: impact of tourism development, impact of running tourist facilities and impact of the tourists themselves. 

Undoubtedly the Bonaire Marine Park has been most successful at managing the impact of the tourists themselves under the banner ‘Bonaire needs tourists… who care’. The Park has successfully used the tourism industry to help police and protect the marine environment. Examples will be given of programs used to educate tourists and industry professionals along with proposals for future work. Examples will also be given of the problems faced and inroads made into minimising the impact of tourism development and the running of tourist facilities on Bonaire.

Tourism Management in the Great Barrier Reef, Australia [Adobe Acrobat Format 45 Kb]

Australia’s international obligations under the World Heritage Convention are to ensure ‘the identification, conservation, protection, presentation and transmission to future generations of the cultural and natural heritage’ of the Great Barrier Reef. ‘Presentation’ is the key word for the tourism industry. The Marine Park tourism industry is the primary vehicle for presentation of the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area.

Tourism is the principal industry in the Great Barrier Reef Region, with an approximate annual value to the Region in excess of A$1 billion (Vanderzee 1996). Visitation to the Reef in 1997 was recorded at 1.6 million visitor-days (Environmental Management Charge data). The volume and profile of tourism use of the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area has changed significantly in the past 20 years, presenting new challenges to managers.

This case study examines the new approach that has been adopted in managing marine tourism use. In particular, it focuses on the use of a permits system to manage the marine tourism industry. We are shifting the mechanism of tourism use management from individual permits to a more strategic and integrated management approach throughout the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park. The major practical benefit of the new system will be its ability to address both the individual and cumulative impacts of tourism use, while also reducing administrative effort. The change has been incremental over the past five years and is not yet complete, but there are a number of lessons learned that may be helpful to other reef tourism managers.

Session 6 Report: Tourism and Protected Areas [Adobe Acrobat Format 17 Kb]