Identification of evaluating criteria for sustainable visitor management of national parks in Sri Lanka

Abstract

With the booming 0/ Tourism industry.eco-tourism has beenpopularized and improved in the world. The places which are practicing ceo-tourism attract increasing number 0/ visitors d'!)' by d'!)' by exceeding their carrying capacity. Therefore, the environment 0/ most 0/ national parks in Sri Lanka adverselY affected due to over visitation by local and foreign visitors. Adaptation 0/ mechanism on sustainable visitor management for the national parks in other countries has been addressed this problem. Yet, there is noproper w'!)' to manage visitors for 1 ational parks in Sri Lanka and most are highlY over visited. Sustainable visitor management is dependent on related set 0/ criteria lvhich are varyingfrom country to country. In the Sri Lankan context, suitable criteriafor sustainable visitor management are notyet identified. This sturIJ is supposed tofifl this gap by identifjing suitable criteriafor sustainable visitor management in national parks in Sri Lanka. Sixty nine criteria were identified through literature reviewunder category0/fifteen factors andfour attributes such aspbysica4 environment, tourism demand management and operational capacity management. Sixty two criteria were prioritized based on how frequentlY tbey are used in various literatures and thry were ranked. Multivariate technique was applied to prioritize the above sixty two criteria based on compatibility and usability between each criterion and relevant indicator. The sixty two criteria were short listed up to twenty four criteria consideringcriteria value more than 1516. These twentyfour were applied to evaluate the current visitor management of Yala National Park as it is the highest over visited national park in Sri Lanka. Evaluation was done considering the perception 0/ the expertise in tourism industry 0/ Sri Lanka. Results indicate that Yala national park has moderate level 0/ sustainable visitor management. And also there are more criteria have to be taken in to account in order to reduce over visitation of Yala nationalpark while managing its environment in a sustainable manner.