Anais Brasileiros de Estudos Turísticos

8

Authors: Barbara McNicol

There is a need in federally protected areas, such as national parks, to investigate the connection between management actions and responsible and sustainable tourism. Environmental supply, as a subset of ecosystem services, is a recent concept that seeks to contribute positively to park management actions about commercial visitor activities and environmental conservation in protected national areas. This can be accomplished by linking commercial visitor demand with understanding of tour operator’s views about environmental supply. This study targets commercial tour operator’s categorization of environmental supply in the Canadian Rocky Mountain national parks of Banff and Jasper. As a concept, environmental supply includes natural features, physical attributes, management initiatives and/or governance policies that influence environmental conservation. Environmental supply, therefore, will include the ecosystems and services of the park destination, visitor education and interpretive programs, zoning and access, environmental impact assessment (EIA) procedures, policies and guidelines, and any other characteristics and initiatives that impact the conservation and/or preservation of nature at a visitorcentered site. How commercial tour operators respond to and manage these for environmental protection in a conservation environment will determine tourism sustainability at the destination. This research presents the results of interviews and a pilot survey that provided information to create initial categories of quality success of environmental supply as defined by commercial tour operators in Banff and Jasper National Parks in the Rocky Mountains of Canada, where we provided a methodology to monitor changes over time by using categories of this research to define quality success indicators of environmental supply that are also parameters of sustainability in high use national parks.

8

Authors: Claude Origet du Cluzeau

A la suite de reportages pas vraiment fiables mais assez calamiteux sur l’accueil des touristes étrangers en France, les pouvoirs publics ont fini par prendre le problème à bras le corps pour y remédier. Devant la faible base théorique de la notion d’accueil, on s’attela au problème, avec un bouquet d’enquêtes –y compris celles du « visiteur-mystère »- réalisées tant en France que dans des pays concurrents sur le plan touristique. Cet article retient une définition opérationnelle de l’accueil, procédure par laquelle on prépare soigneusement l’environnement du visiteur et ses échanges relationnels; il décrit les mesures prises par les secteurs publics et privés, pour optimiser les contacts entre visiteurs et visités, notamment –cas le plus difficile-, avec la population locale. Ces mesures doivent être conduites à tous les échelons du tourisme et respecter les formes culturelles locales de l’hospitalité; au surplus, il s’agit d’un incomparable outil de marketing quand on ajuste les conditions d’accueil aux spécificités des clients attendus.

14

Authors: Yahsuo Ohe

Japan became a super-ageing society in 2005, with rural Japan becoming extremely super-aged. This paper investigated how a rural community conducts tourism activity and how it copes with challenges through studying a community-based rural tourism activity in Chiba. By defining community-based rural tourism as using a bonding type of social capital in the local community, this paper explored the advantages and limitations of this type of social capital when the social capital becomes older. Specifically, it was revealed that community-based rural tourism has done well from aspects of job and income generation, increases in self-confidence and local pride, and to a certain extent coping with the impact of unexpected natural disasters. On the other hand, transferring these activities to the younger generation while maintaining the community-based decision-making system will be challenging. Thus, there comes a time when the use of the traditional bonding social capital within the local community must be expanded toward a more open, wider, and new network beyond the local community.

16

Authors: Carmelita D’Mello, Kaustubh Kamat, Klaus Weiermair, Subhash Kizhakanveatil Bhaskaran Pillai, Miriam Scaglione, Jacob Ganef Pah

This paper examines the perceptions of tourists visiting the state of Goa with regard to the importance given to and the satisfaction level with respect to the infrastructure, facilities, services and amenities available for tourism; to identify infrastructural strengths as well as problem areas which will enable various stake holders to take appropriate measures. Gap Analysis, which is based on Importance-Performance Analysis, was used to determine the gap between tourist perception of importance given before trip and satisfaction level after trip; and paired t-test was used to determine whether the gap was significant. 34 variables with respect to infrastructure, facilities, services and amenities were rated on importance given to and the satisfaction level through a structured questionnaire administered to 1000 tourists. Research findings reveal that in 29 out of 34 variables, there is a significant difference in tourist perception before and after the trip. Further, when plotted on an Importance-Performance Grid; 13 out of the 34 variables fall in Quadrant A indicating an urgent need to focus efforts and resources to improve the same, while the same, when plotted on the Modified 2 Quadrant Importance-Performance Grid, 29 variables fall in Quadrant A (High Priority).