A new research review counters a recently proposed idea published in Nature Climate Change that ecotourism could serve as a mechanism to decarbonise the tourism industry.
The authors - Professor Emeritus Ralf Buckley from Griffith University, Professor Linsheng Zhong from Chinese Academy of Sciences, and Professor Stefan Gössling from Lund University in Sweden - argued while ecotourism could deliver valuable conservation and visitor‑management benefits, it was fundamentally incapable of offsetting or meaningfully reducing the carbon emissions generated by tourism at scale, particularly aviation and large‑hotel operations.
Professor Buckley said claims in the research article about ecotourism-driven decarbonisation were at risk of being politically co‑opted by the tourism and aviation sectors.
"These claims could in fact serve as 'pretences' that delay genuine regulatory action, justify continued emissions growth, and enable further commercial encroachment - or 'land grabs' - inside public protected areas."
Professor Emeritus Ralf Buckley
Drawing on global evidence and a detailed Chinese case study (Jiuzhaigou Forest Reserve), the authors said the climate benefits of ecotourism were negligible when compared with the emissions produced by long-distance tourist travel.
The authors said while ecotourism could achieve important conservation outcomes in specific contexts, it could not restructure or decarbonise the tourism sector, which remained locked into high-emission systems and resistant to policy reforms such as removing aviation fuel subsidies or reducing air travel demand.
"Claims suggesting otherwise are scientifically inaccurate and politically risky," Professor Buckley said.
"Structural obstacles are true enough, such as things like the life of aircraft, engine types, but to argue that ecotourism can compensate is just another political excuse to push more tourism into parks.
"Industry-wide decarbonisation needs institutional changes, for example in relation to subsidies and fuel-tax exemptions.
"Ecotourism can sometimes create benefits locally, but it is far too small to decarbonise the global tourism sector."
The paper 'Ecotourism caught in decarbonisation politics' has been published in npj Climate Action.
