2 Análisis Situacional del Sector de las Microfinanzas
2.2 Las Microfinanzas
2.2.1 Situación actual y desarrollo del Mercado de Microfinanzas en
Adventure tourism brings visitors to the outdoors and by just doing so results in some impact on the environment. However, there are many ways in which you can minimize, prevent, and mitigate environmental impacts in your business:
• Use natural resources appropriately. Travel in areas capable of withstanding human movement and impact.
• Minimize impacts on wildlife. Limit the amount of time you are near wildlife, stay a safe distance from them, and be cautious of noise and other disturbances. Avoid disturbing wildlife during crucial times of the year (e.g., breeding), and take appropriate measures to ensure important feeding, foraging, and breeding areas are not intruded upon. If you are travelling with food supplies, proper food storage is also important.
• Respect vegetation. Don’t walk on sand dunes or sensitive marram grasses, or camp in fragile areas, or pick wildflowers (in some harsh environments, flora can take years to rejuvenate).
• Refrain from accessing sites in particularly sensitive environments. Some very sensitive environments are not capable of withstanding any human impact and should be excluded from your adventure tourism operations.
• Manage the timing of your experience. Don’t plan trips when environmental conditions are too sensitive, e.g., when soil conditions cannot support trampling, or when rivers are too low. Also, consider the times other operators or individuals may be utilizing these sites/resources. • Utilize minimum impact codes and practice no-trace or low-impact travel. For example:
– Pack-it-in/pack-it-out (remove all refuse and supplies/equipment brought in); – Remove, burn, or bury human waste well away from watercourses;
– Discourage bathing in water bodies (only use biodegradable soap if bathing is necessary); – Only use campfires in appropriate areas and utilize camp stoves for cooking when dead
firewood is unavailable; – Keep on trails;
– Cover up/remove all signs of your presence before leaving (“take nothing but photographs; leave nothing but footprints” ).
These practices are particularly important for overnight and multi-day trips.
• Camp only in high tolerance areas or areas designated for camping, taking into consideration the effect of trampling, tenting, etc.
• Manage crowding in terms of both the impact on the resource and the quality of the visitor experience.
• Limit use of sites that are showing environmental degradation such as trail widening, erosion, or excessive vegetation trampling, or alternate between several different sites.
• Strengthen the resource’s ability to withstand human impact, if appropriate, being careful not to undermine the integrity of the resource. Methods can include building trails, boardwalks, latrines, and designated camping sites in heavily used areas, providing refuse containers, developing scenic lookouts, etc.
Page 31 Guide to Starting and Operating an Adventure Tourism Business in Nova Scotia The Four Types of Carrying Capacities You
Must Consider
1. The facility capacity (the physical capacity of the lodge, boat, van, etc.)
2. The environmental capacity (at what point further impact would diminish the quality or integrity of the environment)
3. The social capacity (the point at which visitor enjoyment diminishes)
4.
The cultural capacity (the point at which local cultures become negatively affected) • Educate your clients on the value of the environment and the importance of adhering toenvironmentally responsible practices, and manage the interaction between visitors and the environment. Make visitors aware of the necessity to keep on trails, not to remove souvenirs such as dive site artifacts, etc.
• Reuse, recycle, and reduce waste. Avoid using disposables (such as plastic plates, cups, paper napkins); recycle tins, plastics, cardboard, etc.; use materials/supplies you can reuse, e.g., cloth napkins/table cloths, plastic food containers; and compost where possible. • Use resources efficiently (i.e., water, energy, supplies) in all aspects of your operation. • Pick up and remove litter or refuse you find along your trips.
• Keep group sizes small to avoid damaging the environment and diminishing the quality of the experience.
• Establish and manage carrying capacity thresholds which consider the finite ability of resources to withstand and recover from environmental stresses. (The subject of carrying capacity is a very important one and is the subject of further discussion below.)
• Monitor the environment to gauge environmental impacts and ensure carrying capacities and other environmental management practices are appropriate, making modifications where necessary. For example, if you find that your activities or those of others are negatively impacting the resource, decrease the size of your groups or rotate sites.
• Support other tourism businesses which also have an environmental ethic (e.g., environmentally responsible accommodations).
Understanding Carrying Capacity
A carrying capacity is essentially the maximum level of human impact beyond which
environmental degradation is likely to occur. Carrying capacities will differ by environment; some areas will be more tolerant to use than others and will thus have a higher carrying capacity. If you allow the carrying capacity of
your destination areas to be exceeded, you and your clients will notice a degraded environment and this will threaten both the longevity of the resource and the success of your business as an adventure tourism operator.
At the same time, however, you have to pay attention to the realities of operating your business and attempting to make a profit. It may be that you cannot afford to limit the number of people you will take on a tour; in this case, you may be better off to seek out another location
that does not have such a sensitive environment (and a low carrying capacity). Or, consider increasing your prices and featuring your concern about carrying capacity and the limitations of a sensitive environment as a key USP for your business.
Generally, the lowest value of the four types of carrying capacities should be used as your threshold to help you determine your maximum size of groups, frequency of visits, numbers of tours, etc. Remember too, to take into consideration the cumulative effects of other adventure tourism operators accessing the same sites; this may impact the size and frequency of your trips to a given area.
Selecting An Appropriate Location and Experience Based on
Environmental Factors
Limiting and managing environmental impacts while at the same time developing a profitable business has a lot to do with selecting an appropriate location and experience for your adventure tourism trips. How do you do this?
Consider the techniques we addressed above and choose trip locations that are:
• Suitable for the activity (e.g., good terrain for hiking, adequate river volume for canoeing); • Appealing for their intrinsic or scenic values (e.g., natural phenomena, wildlife, flora,
geology, geography, biodiversity, scenic landscape);
• Able to withstand the pressures of human impact associated with the activity (that is, have a reasonable carrying capacity);
• Not unduly sensitive or fragile;
• Able to handle the number of people on a tour, at a price that is acceptable to the market, to enable you to make a profit.