Abstract
This work intends to verify if there is academic research that proposes innovative strategies for sustainable tourism. It analyses 70 valid documents including theses, dissertations, scientific papers, and reports. Main objectives to explore are which themes stand out most; the difference between academic production in Portugal and Brazil; and how the topics of sustainability, environment, governance, planning, and regulation relate to tourism. A software for qualitative analysis is used to enrich the discussion around sustainable tourism discerning preferential governance strategies. Few works use sustainability indexes, and, if used, most of them are descriptive. For real sustainable tourism, its governance has to be based on appropriate indicators. Measures can empower destinations, providing the information needed to decide accurate and creatively. A challenge for the Portuguese academy on tourism and hospitality is to have an ongoing role in implementing key indicators and in their validation and monitoring.
TopIntroduction
Sustainable tourism is defined as the creation and promotion of a tourism industry that preserves or enhances a country’s social, cultural or environmental capital. Data reveals that the environmental strength of a country is directly related to tourism revenue. Although there is no evidence of direct causality, the more pristine the natural environment of a local the more tourists are willing to access it. Consequently, as the natural capital deteriorates, destinations lose revenue. It is important to recognize that processes and activities associated with tourism also damage the environment. Given the close relationship between natural resources and a very large segment of the tourism industry, a lack of progress on fostering sustainability will reduce tourism development opportunities. Besides environment, also cultural and socio-economic issues become involved in this equation of tourism sustainability. Many works and reports discuss this subject, revealing its increasing importance for today’s global and local decisions about tourism development. Even the communication of sustainability of a destination influences the intention to visit it, as Melo and Farias (2018) acknowledged.
This work aims to establish what proportion of academic works, listed in the scientific repository of open access in Portugal (RCAAP), have proposed innovative governance strategies for sustainable tourism. And among these, which portion has used approaches grounded on international/national sustainability indexes. RCAAP was used as it promotes visibility, access and diffusion of the results of academic production and scientific research in Portugal and Brazil. Academic production on sustainable tourism not always refers to international indexes (such as the Travel & Tourism Environmental Sustainability Index and the Global Destination Sustainability Index). This might be due to different factors such as lack of funding, complexity of data collection and lack of statistical training in tourism schools. This analysis initially looked at 164 theses and other scientific works containing the required keywords: sustainable tourism, sustainability index, and governance. However, the final selection retained 70 stable documents which were well downloadable and according to the criteria considered.
Key Terms in this Chapter
Sustainable Tourism: A balance must be found between limits and usage so that continuous changing, monitoring, and planning ensure that tourism can be managed.
Monitoring: It is the systematic process of collecting and analyzing information to track an issue’s progress toward reaching its objectives. It usually focuses on processes (when/where activities occur, who delivers them, etc.).
Governance: Effective governance practices must reflect the changing business and policy environment, and the evolving roles and competencies of government tourism organizations.
Sustainability Indexes: Are instruments to measure the responsibility in social and environmental areas. The analysis of this issue in tourism is reflected in the publication of specific metrics and reports.
Sustainability: It focuses on meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs. It involves three pillars: economic, environmental, and social.
Indexes: Metrics that serve to measure the performance of a group of assets. An example is a ratio derived from a series of observations and used as an indicator.
Regulation: It is the management of complex systems according to a set of rules and trends. In tourism, it includes legislation affecting this industry.