Environmental impacts of sustainable tourism in Sri Lanka

Abstract

Tourism is one of world’s important industries. It has a great impact as an important way of earning foreign exchange and also has a direct impact on the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of a country, during the last 30 years in the majority of countries where tourism is a key income. As such, tourism is widely recognized as the world’s largest generator of wealth and this will continue to grow during the next decades and tourism will be significant for the national and global economies. Therefore, it is the primary target of the stakeholders of the industry to integrate sustainability dimensions, into its development strategies, especially, the environment it is mostly based upon. The modern tourism industry has become an umbrella industry for many businesses such as accommodation, transportation, entertainment, catering, tour operators and travel agencies. Therefore, tourism industry should take efforts to support the restoration, conservation as well as protection of valuable, natural, historic and cultural sites, landscapes as well unique biodiversity of a country while promoting and developing tourism. In this, the governments as well as stakeholders of the tourism industry such as hotels and tour operators have a significant role in protecting the environment. In this paper, I will be discussing in detail the “Environmental impacts of sustainable tourism in Sri Lanka”, the problems associated with it and how to overcome such problems in the long term as well as the short term.