Ecotourism and natural resource conservation: the ‘potential’ for a sustainable symbiotic relationship

While the tourism industry and environmentalists may traditionally be strange bedfellows, the increasing conversion of land away from its natural state into unsustainable uses may result in the two becoming allies in the fight to protect remaining natural landscapes. This partnership is presented around a proposed sustainable symbiotic relationship between natural resource conservation and the competitiveness of ecotourism destinations. Under this symbiotic relationship, ecotourism destinations benefit in the form of enhanced competitiveness from the protection of quality natural resources while the conservation of natural resources is increasingly valued because these resources are realised as the foundation of the ecotourism industry and the driver of all economic benefits associated with ecotourism. This conceptual paper reviews this relationship and graphically depicts the symbiotic relationship, including the many tangential sustainable outcomes of biodiversity, flood control, water quality, carbon sequestration, and cultural heritage conservation that stem from the increased incentives ecotourism brings to natural resource conservation. The proposed symbiotic relationship between ecotourism and natural resource conservation specifically answers Shellenberger and Nordhaus' (2005) call to increasingly frame environmental issues using strong economic messages if public opinion is to be swayed towards conservation in this present political climate.