Tourism’s Impacts on Natural Resources: A Positive Case from China

Tourism development may result in negative impacts on natural resources owing to overuse and mismanagement. However, tourism may also play positive roles in natural resource conservation, which has rarely been verified in practice, although some researchers have demonstrated this in theory. In this article, taking the Jiuzhaigou Biosphere Reserve as a case study area, we conducted an analysis for the environmental impacts from tourism development based on social survey and interpretation of remote sensing images. The results show that the natural environment was not degraded and some indicators are even improving because all the residents have participated in tourism and given up farming and hunting. It is concluded that it is possible to use tourism as a way to balance natural resource conservation and economic development under the preconditions of making effective policies to encourage and help local people participate in tourism business and to benefit from it.     

Magnetotherapy—a brief excursion through the centuries

The study and observation of electromagnetic phenomena have followed the evolution of human thought from the dawn of civilization to the present day; also magnetotherapy has followed a similar path. Magnetotherapy has been applied and continues to be applied in many branches and fields of medicine, as it accelerates the healing of fractures, has analgesic and anti-inflammatory properties that can help in inflammatory or degenerative diseases of bones, joints and the peripheral nervous system, and stimulates the healing of open skin lesions (such as bed sores, diabetic ulcers) etc. If magnetotherapy has so many fields of application in medicine, we may therefore ask why doubts, prejudice and limitations to its therapeutic use still exist. This brief historical excursion wants to give a small contribution to answer the question.     

Multifaceted Value Profiles of Forest Owner Categories in South Sweden: The River Helge å Catchment as a Case Study

Forest landscapes provide benefits from a wide range of goods, function and intangible values. But what are different forest owner categories’ profiles of economic use and non-use values? This study focuses on the complex forest ownership pattern of the River Helge å catchment including the Kristianstad Vattenrike Biosphere Reserve in southern Sweden. We made 89 telephone interviews with informants representing the four main forest owner categories. Our mapping included consumptive and non-consumptive direct use values, indirect use values, and non-use values such as natural and cultural heritage. While the value profiles of non-industrial forest land owners and municipalities included all value categories, the forest companies focused on wood production, and the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency on nature protection. We discuss the challenges of communicating different forest owners’ economic value profiles among stakeholders, the need for a broader suite of forest management systems, and fora for collaborative planning.

Electronic supplementary material

The online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s13280-012-0374-2) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.     

Applying Fuzzy Logic to Assess Human Perception in Relation to Conservation Plan Efficiency Measures Within a Biosphere Reserve

The objective of this study is to present an efficiency-perception impact assessment based upon the integration of fuzzy logic (FL) of the "Productive Reconversion" conservation program (PRP) instituted by the Mexican government, in the upper Gulf of California and the Colorado Delta Biosphere Reserve. This approach enables environmental analysts to deal with the intrinsic imprecision and ambiguity associated with people's judgments and conclusions. The application of FL to the assessment of program efficiency is illustrated in this work, demonstrating how subjective perceptions can be converted into quantitative values easy to evaluate during the decision-making process.     

Tourists‘ and Locals‘ Preferences Toward Ecotourism Development in the Maya Biosphere Reserve,Guatemala

Ecotourism has been identified as a low impact means to provide income generating opportunities that are complementary to nature conservation as well as the welfare of the local population. The Maya Biosphere Reserve in Peten, Guatemala is one of Central America's largest and most isolated protected areas. And although the area is contains a well-visited archeological site, it has not been developed for ecotourism. In this study choice experiments are used to analyze the preferences toward alternative scenarios of ecotourism of two important stakeholder groups: foreign tourists and educated local residents. Results demonstrate that these two populations of have unequal but similar preference orderings, especially toward: improved national park management and the presence of guides for wildlife viewing. These stakeholder groups had different opinions toward paved access roads and the presence of illegal colonists within the protected area. Both populations favored an entrance fee toward the absence of an entrance fee. These preferences were generally consistent across other socioeconomic indicators. Readers should send their comments on this paper to: BhaskarNath@aol.com within 3 months of publication of this issue.     

Local Peoples' Knowledge,Aptitude and Perceptions of Planning and Management Issues in Nanda Devi Biosphere Reserve,India

Local peoples' knowledge, aptitude, and perceptions of planning and management issues were investigated in Nanda Devi Biosphere Reserve (NDBR) in Uttaranchal State of India. Conflicts ensued between local inhabitants and the management authority due to lack of community participation. Although most respondents seem to claim the knowledge of the objectives of Nanda Devi Biosphere Reserve, the source of information indicates their interaction with the management authority is not frequent. While local population seem to agree on reduced intensity of agriculture with compensation equal to loss of net income, there is a perceptible difference in responses among different age groups. While the younger generation seems to agree to move away to other areas with suitable compensation packages, the older generation prefer those options that require some adjustments in use and access to natural resources. The option of ecotourism as a source of income is acceptable to most respondents, but young and old respondents disagreed about impact of such activity on social behavior of local inhabitants. Among those groups studied, only the “self-employed group” seem to be more interested in ecotourism in comparison to other occupation classes. Gender differences in perceptions are prominent with reference to development options. While the men preferred economic opportunities, the women preferred improved living conditions. An evaluation mechanism similar to the one described in this paper will be helpful to the management authority to assess and modify their management plans to mitigate conflicts with local people.     

Assessment of National Parks affected by naturbanization processes in Southern Europe

This paper assesses land-use changes related to naturbanization processes on three biosphere reserves in Southern Europe. A comparative analysis has been done on the National Parks in Peneda-Gerês in North Portugal, Cévennes in South France and Sierra Nevada in South Spain, using Corine Land Cover data from 1990 until 2006. Results indicate that the process of land-use intensification is taking place in the frame of naturbanization dynamics that could jeopardize the role of Protected Areas. Focusing on the trends faced by National Parks and their surrounding territories, the analysis demonstrates, both in quantitative and spatial terms, the intensification processes of land-use changes and how it is important to know them for coping with increasing threats. The article concludes that in the current context of increasing stresses, a broader focus on nature protection, encompassing the wider countryside, is needed if the initiatives for biodiversity protection are to be effective.     

Extension of sensitivity and uncertainty analysis for long term dose assessment of high level nuclear waste disposal sites to uncertainties in the human behaviour

Biosphere dose conversion factors are computed for the French high-level geological waste disposal concept and to illustrate the combined probabilistic and deterministic approach. Both ¹³⁵Cs and ⁷⁹Se are used as examples. Probabilistic analyses of the system considering all parameters, as well as physical and societal parameters independently, allow quantification of their mutual impact on overall uncertainty. As physical parameter uncertainties decreased, for example with the availability of further experimental and field data, the societal uncertainties, which are less easily constrained, particularly for the long term, become more and more significant. One also has to distinguish uncertainties impacting the low dose portion of a distribution from those impacting the high dose range, the latter having logically a greater impact in an assessment situation. The use of cumulative probability curves allows us to quantify probability variations as a function of the dose estimate, with the ratio of the probability variation (slope of the curve) indicative of uncertainties of different radionuclides. In the case of ¹³⁵Cs with better constrained physical parameters, the uncertainty in human behaviour is more significant, even in the high dose range, where they increase the probability of higher doses. For both radionuclides, uncertainties impact more strongly in the intermediate than in the high dose range. In an assessment context, the focus will be on probabilities of higher dose values. The probabilistic approach can furthermore be used to construct critical groups based on a predefined probability level and to ensure that critical groups cover the expected range of uncertainty.     

Local people's perceptions as decision support for protected area management in Wolong Biosphere Reserve, China

This paper examines local people's knowledge, attitudes and perceptions towards Wolong Biosphere Reserve (WBR) and its management policies. Pertinent data were collected through a questionnaire survey and group discussions. This study revealed that local people's perceptions were affected by many factors, including education, gender, residence location, household size and acreage of land owned. Although most respondents had limited knowledge about WBR because of their absence in WBR management, they held a positive attitude towards WBR. An in-depth analysis of their attitudes and perceptions showed that two potential conflicts might affect biodiversity conservation and protected area management. One of them was the imbalance between the limited cropland holding and the oversupply of the labor force, and the other one was the increase in electricity price versus the decrease in economic incentives for the Natural Forest Protection Project. The study also revealed that relocation was considered unacceptable to most respondents. However, those residing far from the main road were willing to relocate more than those near the main road. Based on our studies, some recommendations are given for improvement of WBR management.