This study examines how residents of nature-based tourism destinations become supportive of sustainable tourism development based on an integrated theoretical framework that combines social exchange theory and bottom-up spillover theory. A survey of 364 residents in Jechon City, South Korea measured their perceptions of tourism impacts using a neutral-phrase questionnaire (non-forced approach). Results from structural equation modeling showed that residents perceive tourism as having a significant positive impact on material and non-material aspects of their lives, which leads to overall quality of life and support for sustainable tourism development. The integration of social exchange theory and bottom-up spillover theory proved to be a useful framework in predicting residents’ support for sustainable tourism development. The study results suggest that to foster local residents’ support for sustainable tourism development, planners should consider the impact of tourism on material and non-material aspects of residents’ lives, emphasize environmental considerations, and focus on long-term benefits.
Country: South Korea
South Korea
Adaptive and collaborative natural resource management has been proposed as a means to navigate the social-ecological system dynamics of resilient systems. However, our understanding of how diverse stakeholders and local actors contribute to collaborative management processes and outcomes is limited, especially with regard to small-scale resource management. This study investigates the role of local people in Korean village grove restoration projects, focusing on bridging linkages and bridging organizations. From a network perspective, we analyze data collected from key informant interviews, document reviews, and field visits to four village groves, to identify key actors and actor groups and to examine their relationships in each restoration project. Along with the relational patterns of local people, the multiple functions of bridging organizations, including accessing critical resources, resolving conflict, enhancing mutual trust, and building local capacity, vary between the four villages. The findings provide insights into the potential of local civil society, through the bridging roles of village-based citizen organizations, to contribute to the emergence of collaborative and adaptive management networks and improved management outcomes.
The forests in the Republic of Korea (ROK) successfully recovered through the national forestation program as did the ecosystem services associated with them. With this positive experience, it is instructive to investigate the economic viability of the forestation program. In this study, we estimated the changes in the key ecosystem services (disaster risk reduction (DRR), carbon sequestration, water yield enhancement, and soil erosion control; 1971–2010) and the monetary investment of the forestation (1960–2010) in the ROK, at a national scale. These benefits and costs were estimated by biophysical and monetary approaches, using statistical data from several public organizations, including the Korea Forest Service and the Korea Meteorological Administration, combined with model simulation. All monetary values were converted to the present value in 2010. The net present value and the benefit-cost ratio of the forestation program were 54,316 million $ and 5.84 in 2010, respectively, in the long-term. The break-even point of the extensive investment on the forestation appeared within two decades. In particular, the enhancements of DRR and carbon sequestration were substantial. This economic viability was ensured by the subsidiary implementations (e.g., participation of villagers, shifting energy source, and administrative regulation). Early and extensive investment in forestation is recommended for economic viability and successful implementation of the program. Our study is expected to provide a scientific rationale for implementing forestation program in other countries.
Water resources management requires policy enforcement in a changing environment. Climate change must be considered in major watershed river restorations in Korea. The aim of river restorations is to provide better water resource control – now and in the future. To aid in policy making in the government sector, ‘vulnerability-resilience indexes’ (VRIs) with a Delphi survey method have been adopted to provide a possible reference. The Delphi survey offers prioritized vulnerability proxy variables based on expert opinions regarding the changing environment in terms of climate change and river restorations. The VRIs of watersheds were improved after river restorations, with the exception of some locations. However, when climate change was taken into consideration in the analysis of conditions after the restorations were completed, the results showed that governments need to provide better mitigation strategies to increase vulnerability resilience in the face of climate change.