Legislation Principles and Operation Efficiency of European and

American Ecotourism

Buyao Guo

College of Applied Science and Technology of Hainan University, Haikou, Hainan, 571101, China

Keywords: European and American ecotourism, legislation principles, operation efficiency.

Abstract: Along with the global problem of deteriorating ecological environment, human gradually establishes clear

and definite norms and constraints on their activities. Ecotourism legislation has always been a focus in

European and American countries. During decades of exploration, human beings constantly strengthened

the legality, scientificity and humanity of ecotourism, obtaining certain achievements and leading to a

brighter and clearer prospect of ecotourism legislation. Based on the study of legislation principles in

European and American countries, the work creatively proposed some strategies to improve the operation

efficiency of ecotourism.

1 INTRODUCTION

Tourism travel is realized on the basis of fully

satisfied material life. In the 1980s, global tourism

activities gradually affected and changed ecological

environment, and then human’s “changing the

world” entered a new stage. Since then, the concept

of “ecotourism” was put forward, and people were

actively or passively influenced by this concept in

their travel and entertainment activities.

Furthermore, national legislation of many countries

begins to emphasize this field. At present,

worldwide ecotourism is showing a booming

situation, and its economic income accounts for

twenty percent of that of the entire tourism industry,

presenting a rapid growth. In European and

American countries, modern ecotourism is

manifested in more abundant forms, such as original

villages, undecorated buildings and unsophisticated

folkways, exactly satisfying ecotourism lovers’

pursuit. Those “alternative” new forms require

special protection from tourism departments and

necessary support from local residents (Xu Xiaoling,

2010). Actually, ecotourism concept aims to call on

human to reduce their interference with the original

form of tourism. The key to ensure authentic

attraction of scenic spots is to keep or restore its

original attraction to the largest extent. Thus,

people’s attitude and purpose of tourism have some

distinct modern characteristics.

2 CONCEPT OF ECOTOURISM

The concept of ecotourism appeared in 1980s and

was put forward by the International Union for

Conservation of Nature (IUKN). It emphasizes that

people should not unilaterally pursue the

entertainment effect of tourism during any travel

activity, ignoring the sustainable development of

scenic spots. Instead, it requires people to pay

attention to local ecological environment and

residents’ living conditions as well. This claim still

shows its correctness and foresight today. If human

continues unlimited exploration of scenic spots,

largely changing national environment and violating

the objective laws of the development of things, it

will lead to exhaustion of tourism resources and

damage of ecological environment. As a result,

natural landscape cannot realize its value of tourism

and appreciation. Furthermore, the contradiction

between human and nature may be further

intensified, thus resulting in irreparable loss and

damage to human society. According to current

rapid developing situation of global tourism

industry, the exploration and utilization of natural

resources is close to saturation (Yao Xiaoyan, 2014).

In fact, nearly every place on the earth is marked

with human’s exploration footprints. Besides, with

the rapid development of tourism, transportation,

catering and other service industries, there will be an

increasing passion of tourism travel. In terms of

111

Guo B.

Legislation Principles and Operation Efﬁciency of European and American Ecotourism.

DOI: 10.5220/0006444901110115

In ISME 2016 - Information Science and Management Engineering IV (ISME 2016), pages 111-115

ISBN: 978-989-758-208-0

111

China, most scenic sports are crowded with tourists

every holiday and golden week. In fact, every

natural landscape has its lifetime and tourist-

tolerance capacity. In addition to the regular

professional maintenance from scenic-spot

personnel and the regular closure of scenic spots,

more efforts are needed to realize a long-standing

and better tourism service for people. In the 2014

International Ecological Civilization BBS held in

Guiyang, Hans Gelman, the Swiss Federal

Parliament Speaker, proposed the idea of mutually

beneficial cooperation for ecological environment

protection. Hans expressed the wish to realize the

complementation and communication with China in

the aspects of transportation, forestry and energy.

Therefore, protecting ecological environment and

realizing ecotourism has become a global wish.

Efforts from different fields and countries around the

world are needed to make the wish come true, thus

guiding tourism industry towards sustainable

development as soon as possible (Zou Qi, 2014).

3 LEGISLATION PRINCIPLES

OF EUROPEAN AND

AMERICAN ECOTOURISM

3.1 Legality

The legislation concept and related work about

ecotourism in European and American countries

appeared earlier than in other areas, and the main

protection content advocated in their work mainly

referred to the protection of the primitiveness and

integrity of natural landscape. That’s why there are

lots of scenic spots of primitive forests and ancient

buildings in European and American countries. In

fact, relevant tourism-supervision departments

transformed their emphasis from creation into

retention and inheritance; such behaviors of

respecting history and time explain why worldwide

tourists are so keen on the scenic sports in European

and American countries. The emphasis of

ecotourism in European and American countries is

firstly manifested in the early and comprehensive

legislation of ecotourism. Such serious attitude and

rigorous rules regulate people’s behaviors and firstly

arouse enough attention from relevant departments

and personnel, making convenience for the smooth

work of legal compliance and law enforcement in

the next step.

As early as in 1916, America began to apply

legal procedures in tourism management, and

National Park Service was the initial management

and law-enforcement department for tourism. In

1993, UK established National Park Protection

Law, mainly aiming to regulate the exploration of

natural landscape and to protect ecological

environment. It can be seen that European and

American countries refined and deepened the

regulations and laws of tourism very early in order

to realize the restriction of tourism industry and

tourist behaviors, thus easing human’s unlimited

utilization of natural resources. Moreover, tourism

administrations in some countries also tried to

separate scenic-spot management from business

management so as to achieve supervision based on

relevant international laws and regulations.

Therefore, the authority of relevant laws and

regulations can be strengthened through various

means.

3.2 Scientificity

With the rapid development of advanced and

scientific management concept and information

technology, human spare no effort to link the work

in different fields with science, hoping to promote

sustainable development of this field through

advanced science. Based on a survey from the

International Ecotourism Society, people’s tourism-

travel choice gradually develops towards

“protectional tourism”. Meanwhile, some

foundations or research institutes organize

“exploration activities”, taking a group of tourism

lovers to some special regions that they are not

familiar with or have not been to before. Thus, they

can investigate local ecological resources and

environment as well as people’s living conditions,

conducting scientific and reasonable evaluation

through the efforts of all members. Therefore, they

can get much knowledge and information for future

protection and development of natural landscape.

Such exploration activity is based on professional

knowledge and exploration spirit. It not only

provides reliable reference for the development of

tourism resources, but also expands people’s ideas

on ecotourism legislation, ensuring the correctness

of specific legislation work. For example, a British

“Blue Adventure Foundation” organized some

people to do a one-month field investigation for the

original region of marine organism in Madagascar.

In the end, they obtained the award from the United

Nations and built a biological protection base there.

Therefore, they realized the most effective

protection to local organisms, laying necessary

foundation for human scientific research and

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ecotourism-resource development in the future.

European and American countries have fully used

their abundant science resources as necessary

foundation of ecotourism resources protection and

legislation. Such combination of science and

ecotourism not only proves enough accuracy, but

also provides good examples for the common

development of tourism industry and scientific

careers for other countries.

3.3 Humanity

Ecological legislation itself is a phased measure

produced with population growth and resource

exhaustion. Thus, there should be some reasonable

explanations for the necessity of ecological

legislation, but people’s recognition and

understanding is another important reason for the

generation of ecological legislation. It is obvious

that some imbalanced-development problems still

exist in tourism industry. However, the key for

people to accept ecotourism concept is whether

those imbalanced-problems affects their self-

interests. In fact, in order to make ecotourism

legislation no longer embarrassed, “human”

immediate interests should be considered from the

beginning. The value of ecotourism is not to help

tourism practitioners gain maximum profits but to

ensure the integrity and lasting vitality of ecotourism

resources. Therefore, the investigation of local

people’s living conditions should also be considered

as the reason for tourism legislation. Thus, local

people’s rights and interests can be fully protected,

making future rational utilization and development

of scenic resources possible. For example,

contaminated land is called “brown land” in the

United States. In 1960s and 1970s, America treated

the brown land of Gas Work Park in Seattle with

2,000 tons of chemical materials filling and leveling

up that local “river of love”, realizing so-called

“treatment”. However, the water quality survey in

1976 discovered that the “river of love” contained

lots of chemicals including some carcinogens. At

that time, 364 residents lived near by and more than

400 students studied in a primary school there. In the

following 20 years, the U.S. government continued

pollution treatment for that river until it was finally

“treated”. After this incident, the United States

enacted related laws in 1980 to improve the

inhumane management of ecological environment.

According to the law, people whose living area were

polluted or occupied can get corresponding

compensation and policy supports from government.

4 OPERATION EFFICIENCY OF

EUROPEAN AND AMERICAN

ECOTOURISM

4.1 Improving efficiency through

“differential treatment”

Ecotourism legislation actually is faced with various

challenges. Natural landscapes in each country have

different characteristics and specific environment.

Thus, it is difficult to apply the same rules or

methods to treat different natural landscapes.

Besides, it is also not easy to realize a scale

management for those natural landscapes. Therefore,

“differential treatment” is necessary in the specific

work of ecotourism management. People’s

distinction of those tourist attractions and natural

resources are firstly established on the basis of field

investigation, because the differences of various

objects can only be accurately defined through field

experiences and investigations. Therefore,

ecotourism legislation and corresponding

management on such basis can realize specific

treatment according to different levels, requirements

and goals. Such treatments can appropriately reduce

management cost and generate more efficient

response between complementation plans and

objects, largely improving the pertinence and

effectiveness of ecotourism legislation. The

treatment of “brown land” in Germany accurately

interpreted the concept of “differential treatment”.

On one hand, large-scale shopping centers and

corresponding urban facilities can be constructed in

areas with lower level of pollution to attract tourists,

thus creating new value for those areas. On the other

hand, heavily polluting factories requiring large cost

of treatment should be shut down for purification

treatment, and then transformed into a factory-

related history museum. This kind of treatment plan,

fully considering economic factors, is a win-win

solution for environment and economy benefits.

Such treatment plans can also be extended to the

specific implementation of ecological-protection

laws and regulations. Thus, human can strictly abide

by the laws and regulations. Meanwhile, they can

also creatively achieve a long-term development

prospect for natural resources and certain economic

values, thus realizing the harmony between human

and nature.

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4.2 Strengthening the participation of

scientific and technological ideas

Many countries pay more and more attention to the

role of science and technology in ecotourism

legislation, but more in-depth exploration efforts

should be paid to better solve the problems and

difficulties in actual work. Such scientific efforts in

ecotourism legislation are not limited to certain

scientific inventions or some advanced technologies.

In fact, some ideological concepts such as advanced

management mode and scientific working methods

also contribute to a better ecotourism legislation. For

example, in the aspect of ecological environment

protection, fund sources and its function ways

present a new direction. America Travel Bureau gets

special funding for ecological environment

protection from the government; at the same time, it

is also supported by taxes from the profitable units

inside the scenic spots and donations from some

social welfare organizations. Therefore, this kind of

funding system increases the special funds at travel

bureau’s disposal and utilization. Meanwhile, it also

optimizes the structure of main behavior bodies of

such protection work, thus further strengthening the

status of ecotourism and environment protection in

public mind. In addition, international cooperation

of ecotourism is developing gradually. Therefore,

the tourism administrations and ecotourism

legislation departments in some countries can share

certain resources in tourism management.

Furthermore, they can also exchange their

experience and lessons of ecological protection and

tourism management through information-network

platform, providing some constructive suggestions

for the management mode of future international

tourism and ecological management. Meanwhile, the

effect of ecotourism legislation can be significantly

improved.

4.3 Enhancing the operability of

legislation

The evaluation of legislation work largely depends

on its implementation effects and feedbacks.

European and American countries have achieved

commendable practices in this respect. Besides, the

standardized application of relevant laws and the

flexibility in corresponding treatment cases help

western countries to achieve smooth and successful

ecotourism management. The United States enacted

Animal Protection Act, Safety Drinking Water Act,

Clean Air Act and some other series of laws and

regulations as the norms of people’s behavior, thus

enabling American to construct good environment-

protection consciousness. For example, it has been a

common rule that certain green area is necessary for

a house no matter where it is built. In summer,

tourists should make a reservation in advance when

planning to visit Yellowstone, indicating the good

feasibility and operability of a perfect legislation in

the United States. In addition, more and more

serious ecological-environment situations and

problems also contribute to establishing relevant

laws and regulations and realizing the concept of

environment protection. The declining air quality,

global warming issue and extreme climate disasters

draw public’s attention to the practice of ecological

protection.

Everybody will go on vacations, and their ways

to get along with environment as well as the results

increase their senses of responsibility and mission.

People with different social roles in different fields

all make better and more obvious effects of

ecotourism legislation, thus achieving greater

practical significance. Laws and regulations related

to ecotourism activities play the charm through

everyone’s effort of compliance with those

regulations and rules. In return, people’s long-term

recognition and practice of the laws will lead to a

huge difference to their living environment

5 CONCLUSIONS

After years’ of efforts from professional tourism-

management personnel and legislation staff, the

ecotourism legislation in some European and

American countries has achieved great results.

Nowadays, natural landscapes are no long

considered as only tourism resources. Besides, the

historical reference value, cultural value and

scientific value of natural landscapes are gradually

discovered and appreciated by the public. This kind

of more scientific and comprehensive recognition of

ecotourism is not only beneficial to tourism

management but also plays a positive role in the

sustainable development of global ecological

environment.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

The work was funded by 2012 Hainan philosophy

and social science planning project “Research of

Hainan Ecotourism Legal Issues”. Project No.:

HNSK(GJ)12—32

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REFERENCES

Xu Xiaoling, Comparison of the Legislation of Wetland

Conservation in China and in America. Science &

Technology Information. 2010(6): 80-81.

Yao Xiaoyan, Economic Thinking of Ecotourism

Development. Commercial Times. 2014(13): 122-123.

Zou Qi, Comparison Study of Western and Eastern

Ecotourism. Management & Technology of SME.

2014(05): 154-155.

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