Does Jetting to Ecotourism Destinations Make Sense?

As a published authority on bird-watching, I was recently invited by the Jamaica Tourist Board to take a bird-watching tour of Jamaica, including visits to ecotourism resorts that profess to maintain the lowest possible carbon footprint. That sounds great in theory, but does ecotourism actually generate more greenhouse-gas pollution than it prevents?

Green resorts can't reduce more carbon than air travel produces. From a greenhouse-gas perspective, the jets carrying tourists to Jamaica, Ecuador or any other ecotourism destination generate more greenhouse-gas emissions with each flight than is saved in several years of the operation of any resort that eschews air-conditioning to preserve the environment.

Yet, ecotourism is vital to the preservation of the environment. Ecotourism, by its very nature, requires the preservation of natural areas and resources such as rain forests, coral reefs and rare animal species and their habitats. Generally, ecotourism destinations are in relatively undeveloped and poorer countries. In many of these countries, people face the hard choice of preserving natural habitats or of living in poverty. Without ecotourism revenue, their only other options include slash-and-burn farming, open-pit mining and clear-cutting of old-growth forests to sell the wood to foreign corporations. Ecotourism, done correctly, preserves irreplaceable natural resources while helping local people provide for their families.

Poverty is the real enemy of natural places. Regular tourism doesn't have the same environmental benefits. Sprawling resort complexes with swimming pools and amusement parks may draw tourists and their money, but they displace nature. Ecotourist resorts, on the other hand, cannot exist without the natural treasure that surrounds them. Undeveloped lands cannot continue to survive if the economic survival of local people requires more destructive development.

Ecotourism profits must benefit local people to be truly sustainable. Ecotourism cannot be dominated by corporate interests. An ecotourism resort that funnels profits away to other countries, or even to the developed cities of the host country, will not long succeed in fostering local stewardship of the land. Unless residents in the immediate area share in the profit generated by ecotourism, the industry will engender resentment among the locals, with environmental protection viewed as just another means by which they are denied the means to support their families.

Ecotourism protects the Earth's wild places. The world's ecological treasures are irreplaceable; once gone they are gone forever. Species driven to extinction by subsistence hunting or habitat destruction cannot be recreated. While the exhaust of jet planes carrying tourists around the world is detrimental to the well-being of the Earth, the balance must tip in favor of preserving the wild areas and the wild things that live there. By providing a viable alternative path to prosperity for local people, ecotourism is the best, and perhaps only, way to protect the vital areas of the planet's overall ecosystem.

Sources:

www.associatedcontent.com/article/1868487/how_to_reduce_the_carbon_footprint.html

www.associatedcontent.com/article/2315259/the_earths_ice_cream_is_melting.html

www.associatedcontent.com/article/2481292/lower_your_energy_bills_by_planting.html

www.associatedcontent.com/article/2846062/the_economics_of_green_technology.html