Here’s how nature conservation, tourism can coexist despite conflicts – travel

The concept of sustainable nature tourism plays a key role in mediating conflicts between tourism and nature conservation, a new study from the University of Eastern Finland shows. The study takes a geo-historical approach to analyse the environmental conflict surrounding the founding of Koli National Park in Finland, where the idea of sustainable nature tourism was used as a way out of the conflict. In Koli National Park, sustainable nature tourism has proven to be a useful concept for conflict resolution. “Adopting the principles of sustainable nature tourism helped the national park’s management to reach nature conservation goals. Moreover, the hopes and wishes of local residents and companies on how to develop tourism and the economy were also taken into consideration as part of sustainability, and this fostered a positive attitude towards the national park…