SUSTAINABLE STRATEGIES IN MANAGING OVERTOURISM DESTINATIONS.

Abstract

The antecedents of tourism growth originally were supposed to aid travel and not necessarily trigger negative impacts. However, in many destinations, tourism demonstrably creates more problems than benefits as the growing number of tourists increases the use of natural resources, causes sociocultural impact, and exerts pressure on infrastructure, mobility and other facilities. The current situation shows that the focus of tourism growth is all about rising numbers of visitors instead of emphasising the need to shift away from mass tourism and head towards a more sustainable form of tourism. There has been increasing discussion about overtourism and the phenomenon reflects challenges of managing growing tourism flows into tourism destinations and the impact of tourism on destinations and local residents. This conceptual paper aims to discuss the concept of overtourism and relate it to sustainability because the rising negative impacts of overtourism has led to calls for sustainable approaches, including those that strive for balancing the right to travel and the right to live. Adequately managing tourism to the benefit of visitors and residents alike has always been a fundamental issue for the global tourism industry. It is important that tourism development has to reorient itself away from the goal of ever-increasing tourist arrivals towards broader objectives of socially, culturally and ecologically sustainable qualitative growth.