Effects of Tourism on the Environment

Effects of Tourism on the Environment

Tourism is a big part in not just the United States but in every countries economy. It is constantly growing and according to the United Nations World Tourism Organization there are more than 800 million people that travel either internationally or domestically each year (Goodstein C. Traveling Green. Natural History. Jul/Aug 2006; 115:16.). The world of tourism is always evolving the technology of travel has made it easier and more intriguing to travel. It is believed that the number of people traveling will grow by as little as 4% each year over the next twenty years. This means that the number of travelers a year could reach a staggering one billion people a year (Goodstein C. Traveling Green. Natural History. Jul/Aug 2006; 115:16.).

The financial gain that comes of this is great for a country. In Rwanda for example they charge 375 dollars per person to go out and see the silverback gorilla that is indigenous to the area. This works out to be about 1 million dollars a year for the government to help deter the cost of damages that may be directly caused by tourism. Other countries that do this include the Galapagos Islands, which generates in excess of $38 million a year, and also in Belize the government uses a conservation tax of $3.75 for every foreign visitor leaving the country. The tax in Belize generates almost 750,000 dollars a year to help the government with conservation.

With the advantages of financial gain come some drawbacks. The environment is said to take a big hit when dealing with the effects of tourism. There are a lot of things that are said to happen when dealing with the effects, anything from water in lakes being impure due to nutrients that may be added to it while people are swimming in it. The example that was used in the journals were the bodies of water around the Fraser Islands in Australia. It was said that tourists may be bringing nutrients in directly from another area (i.e. sand from another beach with different nutrient on their feet, or water with different nutrients in it). The other one that I find quite entertaining was nutrients that me in a humans urine that have a negative effect on the organisms such as coral, or fungi that are in the lake. (Hadwen L., Bunn S., Arthington, A,. Mosisch T.