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Nicola Caygill’s sustainable tourism thesis:

Luxury ecotourism: Case study of The Great Barrier Reef as a sustainable tourism thesis

The Abstract is from Nicola’s dissertation (more info into page: “sharing people” )

The paper uses the case study of luxury ecotourism resorts of The Great Barrier Reef Marine Park in Queensland Australia to look at three elements of luxury ecotourism resorts, namely, successfully combining eco-ness with luxury, the ethics of profiting from a finite natural resource and the public sectors role in the development of luxury ecotourism.  The findings of the paper suggest that it is possible to successfully combine accreditations based on both ‘eco-ness’ and luxury, however, if the business where to be operating within a unique environment,  it may not be possible to satisfy both accreditation types and therefore impose accreditation mutual exclusivity based on either star rating or environmental sustainability.  The paper found that economic leakage may still exist in luxury ecotourism businesses in the Great Barrier Reef and that the multiplier effect holds high significance in these remote environments.   The type of a luxury ecotourism businesses conservation contribution proves to be a yardstick for its level of ethics. Although conservation contribution is mandatory for eco-accredited luxury ecotourism businesses, it is not mandatory to conserve the environment on which the resort stands.  A situation may occur whereby a resorts conservation contributions are directed toward activities of the marine park in general, this does not mitigate any negative environmental effects that a resort may contribute to.  The paper also found that public sector provided sufficient support and that its role was clear in the encouragement of the development of luxury ecotourism, however, the majority respondents did not feel the public sector involves itself enough in the development of luxury ecotourism.

Are you interest to read the complete dissertation? please write here a comment or contact me using the proper form situated into the “contact information” page!

Nicola and I will be really happy to hear your observation and comments!

Sara

2 Responses

  1. Hello Sara,

    I would very much like to read the full dissertation as I am very interested in combining both luxury and sustainability.

    Thank you.

    Kind Regards
    Maurice