ecotourism

I ¨borrowed¨ this picture from the internet



Many Third World countries are focusing on quick industrialization and urbanization, but Costa Rica turned to ecotourism as its key to economic development. Even though Costa Rica is a very small country, about the size of West Virginia it still has great biodiversity including lush rain forests, volcanoes, scenic beaches, and exotic wildlife. According to a case study by TED, the nation’s tourist industry brings in about 1 million visitors annually and generates approximately $1 billion a year, making it Costa Rica’s second largest source of income. The research I found for bananas and ecotourism has some conflicting information so I will better inform you once I myself hear information from their known industries. I found that in terms of bringing in foreign currency, tourism is only second to the electronic components sector led by INTEL (which we saw today) and earns more foreign exchange than the nation’s former staple exports, and coffee and bananas combined. The expansion of ecotourism has definitely boosted Costa Rica’s overall economic development. It has allowed for employment opportunities to new areas and other general economic benefits to the local communities and the economy in general. As Martha Honey, the author of Ecotourism and Sustainable Development: Who owns Paradise? and former resident of Costa Rica, puts it, "They do ecotourism very well in Costa Rica." (Egan, 2001). I am anxious to see what I hear firsthand about ecotourism in Costa Rica while we are visiting.



¨As Katrina Brandon of the Nature Conservancy describes it, in its ideal form ecotourism would¨...
1.Provide valuable financing for parks and conservation efforts,
2.Serve as economic justification for the preservation of nature parks and wildlife,
3.Reduce exploitation of conservation areas by supplying local peoples with viable economic alternatives,
4.Promote environmentalism and conservation, and
5.Encourage private conservation efforts (Lizano, 2001).