What is ecotourism?
“Travel
to relatively undisturbed or uncontaminated natural areas with the specific
objective of studying, admiring, and enjoying the scenery of its wild plants
and animals, as well as any existing cultural aspects found on these areas.”
(Hector Ceballos-Lascurian, 1983)
Ecotourism
demands more than simply visiting an ecological landmark. The International
Ecotourism Society defines ecotourism as “responsible travel to natural areas
that conserves the environment and improves the well-being of the local
people.” (TIES, 1991)
It
can also be defined as “Recreation involving people visiting places and
spending money wholly or in part to experience unusual biological communities.”
(Primack, 2002)
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| Tourism |
What is biodiversity?
Biodiversity
refers to the variety of biological species living across the world in various
locations. This term includes all plants, animals and microorganisms living in
all possible ecosystems. These diverse species each play an important role in
their specific ecosystems.
Ecotourism's Effect on Biodiversity
Ecotourism
assists in preserving biodiversity due to the active role ecotourists play in
learning about, raising money for and protecting the area they visit. According
to The Nature Conservancy, nature tourism, which involves passively visiting
natural sites, lacks the beneficial aspect of ecotourism and has the potential
to cause harm if done haphazardly.
Ecosystem functioning
Ecosystem functioning reflects the collective
life activities of plants, animals, and microbes and the effects these activities;feeding,
growing, moving, excreting waste, etc. have on the physical and chemical
conditions of their environment. (Note that functioningmeans showing activity.
and does not imply that organisms perform purposeful roles in ecosystem-level
processes.) A functioning ecosystem is one that exhibits biological and
chemical activities characteristic for its type. A functioning forest
ecosystem, for example, exhibits rates of plant production, carbon storage, and
nutrient cycling that are characteristic of most forests. If the forest is
converted to an agro ecosystem, its functioning changes. Ecologists abstract the
essential features of an ecosystem into two compartments, the biotic and the
abiotic. The biotic compartment consists of the community of species, which can
be divided functionally into plant producers, the consumers that feed on
producers and on each other, and the decomposers. The abiotic compartment
consists of organic and inorganic nutrient pools. Energy and materials move
between these two compartments, as well as into and out of the system.
Ecosystem processes are quantified by measuring rates of these movements (e.g.,
plant production, decomposition, nutrient leaching or other measures of
material production, transport or loss). Ecosystem functioning, in turn, is
quantified by measuring the magnitudes and dynamics of ecosystem processes. The
functioning of an ecosystem results from interactions among and within
different levels of the biota, which ecologists describe as a nested hierarchy.
For example, green plant production on land is the end product of interactions
of individual plants nested within populations; interactions among populations nested
within a single species; interactions among a variety of species nested within
a group of functionally similar species; and so on up to the level of interactions
between different types of ecosystems nested within landscapes. (ShahidNaeem
et-al, 1999)
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| The ecosystem |
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