The global tourism market is a dynamic and contradictory economic engine that can bring great benefits and great damage to destinations worldwide Studies show that environmental concerns are growing dramatically in the tourism marketplace, So much So That in the next 15 years they may become the number to concern or the traveling public.

Of course, environmental concerns are only one factor that can be isolated and analyzed, and the fact is that many trends are contradictory. For example there is universal agreement that new communications technology will have more influence than any other factor on how people travel and choose their travel products in the next fifteen years Internet technologies, cellular phones, faster trains, jets and boats will all transport the traveling public to destinations with more ease, at less cost, and faster than ever before. There is cause to believe that this could result in dramatic, new increases in international travel numbers, putting a great dear of pressure on fragile natural destinations worldwide

In examination of the most recent statistical reports on global travel trends indicates that intentional tourism will grow annually between 4.3% and 6.7% annuity in the next 20 years, for above the world's predicted economic expansion of 3% per annum (1) Yet this figure assumes that only 7% of the total global population will be taking part. From the point of view of mainstream market analysts, this means that the international tourism industry remains in its infancy compared to other economic sectors. Nonetheless, 7% of the global population will be making a total of 1.6 billion trips by the year 2020(1) this represents an enormous challenge to tourism planners and managers worldwide.

Egypt, like many other nations, would like to see a significant new portion of this growing market. But there are clearly many difficult choices to make ahead. In this paper, I will attempt to analyze how social and environmental concerns will affect the global tourism market in the next 20 years, and how this influences regional abilities to attract a market share that will both support their economy and help them to maintain a natural and cultural environment that is worthy of global attention.
Global Market Share and Determinant5

Europe still dominates the global market share for international tourism with nearly 60% of the global tourism market traveling to Europe (see Figure 1). However, nearly 90% of European inbound arrivals come from Europe!(1) it is expected that Europe. Will lose some of its market edge in the next 20 years, regardless it will still dominate the international tourism marketplace for years come. More Europeans taking trips outside of their own region will actually cause much of the “erosion” of the European market. In fact, Europeans are projected to take over 6% more extra-regional trips in the next 20 years. This represents an important opportunity for 
(1) countries in the Middle East. which are expected to See a doubling of European clientele in the same time frame  Figure 1: International Tourist Arrivals -1998
(2) Word Tourism Organization 1999 

Influences on global travel trends have been catalogued by a variety of entities See Figure 2 for WTO’s version). Two interesting parallel and contradictory
trends seem to be developing simultaneously:

The growth of the tourism economy, and the ability to deliver tourism services via improved technologies is leading to a mass tourism economy that can deliver low cost, high volume, mainstream services with increasing efficiency.

The increased education of the global marketplace, the growing awareness of socio-cultural and environmental issues, and the ability of new technologies such as the Internet to deliver information on tourism impacts on destinations Worldwide, is fueling a demand for specialized services that deliver unique, responsible services that are not damaging to the environment
Figure 2:Influences on global travel trends

Economic
Continued moderate to good rates of global economic growth -Above average economic performance of the Asian tiger economies -Emerging importance of new tiger economies (a China, India, Brazil, Indonesia Rsia) -Widening gap between rich-poor countries -Spread at harmonization of currencies 2. Technology
Information technology development
Transport technology advances
Political
Removal of barriers to international travel
Transport and other forms of deregulation
Demographic 
Aging population and Contracting workforces in industrialized countries leading to more South to North migration
Erosion of the traditional western household
Globalization
Growing power of international economic and market forces and consequent reduced control of individual states and non-global corporations
Localization
Conflict in developing countries between identity and modernity
Demand form groups defined on ethnicity religion and social structures to be recognized in their own rights
Socio-Environmental Awareness
Boosted public awareness of socio-cultural end environmental issues
Greater media reporting on major global problems
Living and working Environments
Growing urban congestion both in the Industrialized end (especially) developing worlds
Change from “Services” to “Experience” Economy
Focus switching to delivering unique experience that personally engages the customer
Marketing
Use of electronic technology to identify and communicate with market segments and niches
Adapted from wand Tourism Organization (1)in a fascinating Delphi study(3), the Alliance Internationale de Tourisme (AlT)
found that tourism experts from every continent predict that,”nature and a clean environment, and increasing environmental awareness “will become the number one determinant of consumer demand intro next 15 years, both in international and domestic travel.

This investigation found similar key trends as WTO, but with somewhat different results:

Modern technologies will radically change tourism with new electronic reservation Systems, interactive advertising media- and new direct distribution capabilities such as on-line booking. This new media- will lead to several key trends in tourism demand:
Better value for money
Better more personalized services
Higher demand for quality of experience and uniqueness
 

A clear and long-term concern for environmental conservation will result from increasingly poor environmental news worldwide. This concern will lead to several key trends in tourism demand:
  A stronger motivation to travel to intact environments 
 An increasingly critical and aware market that will force the travel and leisure industry to change and improve environmental performance

While the public will have an increasingly dominant concern for environment conservation, the AlT study does not show that demand will fall off as a result. Rather, they see a renaissance of educational and environmental niche market travel, thanks again to the” unlimited information possibilities of the new media."

All types of tourism will benefit from the growth in the international tourism market. Obviously not all of this growth will be good for the environment. The “sun and sand” market remains a very big factor in tourism supply offeringsworldwide. The AlT experts predict that sun and sand tourism will not diminish but will not grow as quickly either, because it will be increasingly perceived as potentially damaging to the environment. At the same time, ecotourism is seen as having high growth prospects over the next 15 years, because it will increasingly fit with the growing environmental concerns of travelers worldwide.

What is Ecotourism and How did it Evolve?

A number of impopublications appeared in the early1990s. Identifying ecotourism as a promising conservation tool. Elizabeth Boo’s Ecotourism, potentials and pitfall, published by World wildlife Fund-us in 1990 suggested that properly enacted nature tourism can safeguard protected areas by providing local peoples with revenues that give local communities an incentive to respect the protected area Conservation International's publication, Ecotourism: The uneasy Alliance stated that ecotourism's goal is to capture a portion of the global travel market by attracting visitors to natural areas and using the revenues to fund local conservation and fuel economic development.

The Ecotourism Society (TES) was formed in 1990 to unite the conservation and travel communities. TES identified key trends that were leading to the urgent need for a new kind of responsible travel (see figure 3).

Figure 3: Trends Leading to Ecotourism

Increases in the overall travel market

Growth in popularity of vacations to natural areas - particularly dramatic growth tests parks in developing countries.

Massive dissatisfaction with the simplistic travel packages offered by travel
firms and facilities.

Urgent need to generate funding and human resources for the management of protected areas in ways that meet the needs of local rural populations.

Recognition of the importance of tourism within the field of sustainable development. The Ecotourism Society 1995 In the 1990s, private sector businesses that already depended on nature tourism attractions or adventure travel began to realize that they could take the initiative & conserve the environment and offer significant benefits to local people Tour operators, selling trips to the Galapagos Islands, Costa Rica, Kenya and Nepal, where some of the early players in this movement. Some operators argued that they were using ecotourism principles for 20-30 years.

Local communities, interested in the economic benefits of tourism, began formulating their own strategies to keep tourism culturally sensitive while bringing much needed income to rural regions. This style of community-based tourism become integrated with eco and nature tourism, as community goals often were targeted at conserving the local environment and using local natural resources as a primary tourism attrition.
Travelers themselves began to be concerned about “traveling lightly" and not leaving behind a legacy of negative environmental and cultural, impacts. As David Western 
(4) noted, “more visitors are attuned to the harm they can do, to the value of wilderness and to the concerns of local people.

The final result of all these trends was the evolution at ecotourism that merged the conservation and travel fields. In 1991, The Ecotourism Society board of directors defined ecotourism as, “responsible travel to natural areas that conserves the environment and sustains the well being of local people.”

Ecotourist Preferences

Ecotourists have always been strongly attracted to national parks and protected areas. Surveys from the early 1990s showed national park visitation was rising rapidly in key ecotourism countries, such as Costa Rica. Foreign visitors to Costa Rica’s parks skyrocketed from 65,000 in 1982 to 273,000 in 1991 a 30% annual increase
(5). This was precisely the same time that the term
ecotourism “was coined - permanently linking off-the-beaten-path travel to exotic” parks in Costa Rica with the ecotourism boom in traveler’s minds.

From I 983 to 1993 visitor arrivals to Kenya grew by 45% (372.000 to 826.000). The Kenya wildlife Service 
(6) estimates that 80% of Kenya’s tourist market is drawn by wildlife and that the tourism industry generates a third of the country‘s foreign exchange earnings. While visitation to Kenya's wildlife parks declined by a % in 1995 from the previous year, revenue increased due in part to better collection of park-entry fees.

Other countries quickly began to note similar trends. Australia undertook a thorough survey of its nature-based tourists in 1995. 
(7) Results firmly confirm at national parks and reserves have "high appeal" among international visitors to Australia. Tested against a dozen other forms of outdoor activities (e.g. canoeing, outback safari tours, and snorkeling), visiting national parks had nearly double or ever triple the appeal of most other nature based activity options. Of 7 million foreign visitors to Australia, an astonishing 50% went to at least one national

park during their stay in 1995. This was a 10% increase over the

previous year, and Australian analysts predicted that “high growth” would continue.

Table 1: Visitation rates to nature-based destinations

Table 1 provides a comparison of international visitor growth rates for key countries that are known for their natural reserves. South Africa provides

Another fascinating example of a country that has fueled its extraordinary 108% per annum growth rate by showcasing its nature reserves.

Table 2: International Visitor Activities in South Africa
 
 

Table 2 shows that game and nature reserves are the number one activity for visitors to the country in 1997, rising by 2% over the previous year and a hefty .0% over any other selected activity. Given that s. Africa is also know for its casinos, it is fascinating to note that visitors going to s. Africa are nearly 3 times more likely to go to a game reserve than they are to a casino.

Ecotourist Motivations

Nearly all the research on ecotourist motivation comes out of N America,
because of the greater acceptance of the term in this outbound marketplace.

In the United States, the Roper Organization classifies about 22% of Americans (about 49 million adults) as “true environmentalists." (9) They separate this group into two categories:
1. True-Blue Greens who are people whose behavior is consistent with strong environmental views. (20 million Americans)
2.Green-back Greens who are people willing to pay substantially higher prices for “green” products (20 million Americans)

In general, these individuals have higher than average incomes and are college educated. The study also shows that women are generally more environmentally conscious than men. It is this group that can be equated to the target ecotourist market.

Based on data collected by a survey completed by HLA and APA Consulting firms, T ES has constructed the following ecotourist market profile of North American travel consumers (10):

Figure 4: Ecotourist Market Profile:

Age: 35-54 years old, although age varied with activity and other factors such as cost.
Gender: 50% female and 50% male although clear differences by activity were found,
Education:82% were college graduates.
Household composition: No major differences were found between general tourists and experienced ecotourists *.
Party composition: A majority (60%) of experienced ecotourism respondents stated they prefer to travel as a couple, with only 15 % stating they preferred to travel with their families, and 13% preferring to travel alone.
Trip Duration: The largest group of experienced ecotourists (50%) preferred
trips lasting 8-14 days
Expenditure: Experienced ecotourists were willing to spend more than general tourists, the largest group (26 %) stating they were prepared to spend $1.001-$1,500 per trip.
Important Elements of trip: Experienced ecotourists’ top three responses were 
(1) wilderness setting, 
(2) wildlife viewing, and 
(3) hiking/trekking.

Motivations for Taking next Trip: Experienced ecotourists-top two responses were
(1) enjoy scenery/nature, 
(2) new /places.
Experienced ecotourists = Tourists that had been on at least one “ ecotourism” oriented trip and Experienced ecotourism was defined in this study as nature / adventure / culture oriented travel. HLA and ARA Consulting (10)
Very little data is available on European interests and attitudes towards nature basedtravel. The Australian study of its inbound nature based market 
(7) demonstrates that a higher percentage of Germans (20%), Swiss (23%), and Scandinavians (18%) were Interested in Australia because at its nature-based outdoor activity than any other inbound market. By contrast only about 10% of Americans were interested in Australia for this reason and 12% of Canadians (See Table 3). The scuba/snorkeling market - a key outdoor market for both Australia and Egypt - is up by 5% for visitors from the U.K. and Ireland, 11% for Germans and 22% for Scandinavians between 1993 and 1995 (Table 4). These statistics certainly indicate that Europe will be an excellent target for appropriate ecotourism niche marketing techniques - but the evidence is still very slim.
Table 3. Influence of Nature /outdoor Activities on Visitors, Australia

Table 4 Visitor Participation in nature-based activities, Australia
 

Will Ecotourism Help Pay for Protection?

There is excellent evidence that ecotourism can help to pay for the conservation of natural resources. Studies have been undertaken for over a decade now to demonstrate that countries can raise local economic benefits and use wilderness resources as a primary attraction for visitors without destroying the “goose that laid the golden egg." The key is to raise fees for international visitors, collect fees and use the fees for environmental protection.

Table 5 gives an excellent, if old, example of how three countries have succeeded at just that. Bhutan and Ecuador have continued successfully with their strategies and are maintaining relatively good caps on visitation while still driving up revenue. Parc de Volcanoes National Park in Rwanda had a huge success with this strategy in the 1980s, seeing their revenues nearly triple between 1980 and 1988, while maintaining a strict cap on visitors between 1984 and 1988. While this strategy has not borne fruit since the civil war, Rwanda one of the poorest countries in the world) set the example for all developing countries, proving that highly valuable wildlife resources can be protected from over-visitation while at the same time dramatically improving the nation’s financial ability to protect them.

Table 5. Fees and Revenues for Three Ecotourism Destinations.
 

Most recent estimates from Charles Darwin Foundation.
(12) Adapted from World Resource Institute 
 

Results continue to be gathered on other important wildlife related tourism activities. The Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society published a report in 1994 showing conclusively flat whale watching has offered dramatic benefits to depressed fishing communities worldwide, which has undoubtedly taken pressure off global regulators to permit commercial whaling. “In New Zealand, the residents of Kailoura transformed a severely depressed economy between 1986 and 1991, with estimated direct revenues of $3.75 million annually.

Prospective whale watchers now make up 4% of all visitors to New Zealand, and are projected to grow 8-10% per year.” Similar results were found for coastal communities in the U.S. , Norway, Iceland and Argentina. (13)

How much the tourism industry will support national parks may well vary and depend on nationality. In the study looking at German and U.K tour operators( 11), it was found that U.K tour operators are nearly 3 times more likely to support extra fees for the support of a rural development fund associated with parks char the Germans.

Conclusions

Having tracked and lectured on ecotourism statistics are trends for nearly 10 years, I was personally impressed and even a touch amazed at how many new studies are confirming the impotence of environmental concerns on travel trends worldwide. It was not that long ago that experts suggested that ecotourism was a flash in the pan trend that was being generated by overzealous.

conservationists from America and Australia.

What current market trends indicate is that visitation to natural areas will continue to increase, and that tourists will become increasingly aware and concerned if they see that destinations are not being properly managed. With the Internet and chat rooms at their fingertips. Consumers’ word of mouth could become quite devastating to destinations that do not do their homework.
Preparing for visitors and making certain they are a benefit, is not the subject of this paper, but a few comments must be made. Proper tracking of visitors in natural areas worldwide is still uncommon. Tools to ensure that they do not harm fragile areas am only being used sporadically, mostly in developed countries. Regulations, if they do exist, are often not enforced, while park and protected area managers are rarely given the budgets they need for monitoring. This picture needs improvement, and the improvement needs to come from budgets allocated to management of protected areas from the tees charged to tourists If these fees never “hit the ground”, serious damage to the country’s natural resources can take place, such as in the country of Kenya - where rampant off
road driving in national parks has cause harm to ecosystems. And just as bad, an ecotourism destination can suffer serious damage to its image - something that all of the trends in this paper suggest will become a rapidly escalating problem for countries that are not properly managing their resources because of new technologies.

Social responsibility is also so emerging issue on the global horizon, not only in at World Trade Organizations conferences or for companies like Nike, but for Tourism suppliers worldwide. Increasingly consumers will wan to know that they are staying in hotels where employees are treated according to fair labor standards, defined by international standards. In a new study by the Tearfund 14) of Great Britain, 59% of all respondents living in the U.K said that they would a willing to pay more for their holiday if money “went to guarantee good wages and working conditions, to preserve the environment, or directly to a local charity.” According to this study, 55% would be willing to pay 5 % more for an average extra cost of $50. “Given that U.K. travelers presently spend $4 billion in overseas holidays in developing countries, this increase could be worth $200 million per year, a significance difference to the lives of those who work in roost destinations worldwide.”

The potential for ecotourism to provide a powerful economic engine that will help conserve natural environments and benefit local people has never been higher. After summarizing these trends, it is clear that the time a right for every country to set firm policies. Destinations that want to capture the Internet-savvy, environmentally conscious consumers of the future must understand that a portion of the growing toueconomy will need to be reinvested back into the protection of natural resources, higher wages and benefits for local people and better management of tourism resources, If not - destinations will risk the consequences of losing this burgeoning marketplace.

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4.Western D- 1993 Forward in: Lindbergh, K. and Hawkins, D. (ed.), Ecotourism: A guide for planners and managers, The Ecotourism Society, Vermont, USA.

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