Coral Reef Tourism, Sustainability and Development : how to Manage it All?

Abstract

Coral reef-related tourism contributes to economic development and can provide local communities with non-extractive alternative livelihoods, however it is not an environmentally neutral solution, and it needs an integration of policy and management action to harmonize tourism benefits and coral reef health. This thesis aims to identify ecological impacts related to tourism and to examine perceptions of managers and users of coral reef management policy implementation, how they see their own roles, and the effects of policy legislation on the way they function. The synthesis of findings suggests that there exists a suite of conceptual indicators that Thai authorities might employ to enhance the sustainability and effectiveness of management policy for reef areas in eastern Thailand. In this study, I compared prevalence of coral diseases and prevalence of signs of compromised health to distinguish direct and indirect impacts between coral reefs that have different levels of visitation and infrastructure. Surveys of reefs throughout the Eastern of Thailand indicated poorer health of reefs near infrastructure rather than reefs at more isolated islands. Visitation intensity influenced reef health only where no physical infrastructure was present (or nearby). I also found significant increases in nitrate, ammonium, phosphate and total suspended sediment in gradients toward sites near infrastructure, whereas different leveis of visitation made no difference to these metrics. Managers necessarily must devise a compromise between the convenience of siting tourism infrastructure close to the desired location and the ecological consequences of doing so. They must also recognise that the marine ecosystem is an open system, such that activities nearby but outside MPAs will affect the ecosystems within the parks. A socio-ecological study to answer the question of how stakeholder perceived the implementation of coral reef management policy implementation was undertaken to examine the perceptions of stakeholders who benefit from the reef resources.. The perceptions of coral reef managers and users of the planning, process and outcome of coral reef management policy and regulations were obtained using a mixed-method interview approach. DNP manages coral reef within the boundaries of gazetted Marine National Parks solely and independently of DMCR who are ultimately responsible for all reef and non-reef coastal areas elsewhere (apart from several small areas under the purview of the Royal Thai Navy). Unfortunately, the majority of resource managers are not sufficiently equipped with locally-suited conservation policy or planning. The plans that DNP managers had been using have not been substantively modified since they were drafted over a decade ago; a situation exacerbated by the paucity of feedback from local sites and stakeholders. DMCR managers were hampered until recently because the governing legislation was not ratified by parliament (and hence not truly enforceable). Users (hoteliers and tour operators) felt that they were seldom consulted about policy matters and had limited opportunity to participate in the making of decisions that involve coral reef management. Moreover, they are unlikely to participate in conservation activity because of the dearth of communication between managers and users. The finding of this part suggests that success of marine resources management needs both effective management training, and comprehensive policy, together with close communication between managers and end users to ensure strong support from local communities. Although this study was not intended to in any way evaluate management effectiveness nor performance of management agencies, it provides several insights into ways that resource management practice and policy might be improved. Fragmentation of policy implementation between and amongst agencies is a barrier to sustainable reef-based tourism management in Eastern Thailand's highly coastal tourism development. Stress factors stemming from tourism do not respect the MPA boundaries, so the integrity of MPAs requires management agencies to interact positively with stakeholders outside the park boundaries. The finding of this thesis suggest that best practice will incorporate Integrated Coastal Management (ICM) approach into existing management policy to enhance cooperation among agencies that are responsible for coral reef resources and also agencies responsible for the health of the marine environment.