Sustainable tourism management and monitoring

Data di submission: gennaio 2015
Data di accettazione: dicembre 2015

Destinations, organizations, public administrations, and NGOs that are involved in the tourism market face significant ongoing challenges in managing and monitoring sustainability of tourism activities. The Brundtland Report by the World Commission on Environment and Development, Our Common Future (1987), defined the common concept of sustainability in terms of balancing the needs of current and future generations. Consequently the sustainability of tourism is now much broader than just environmental considerations. It is commonly considered to be comprised of the three pillars: the environment, the economy and the community.
This research titled Sustainable Tourism Management and Monitoring: Destination, Business and Stakeholder Perspectives considers how to balance core aspects of sustainable tourism using best practice management techniques. The research investigates the interplay of sustainable tourism, management, monitoring, destination life cycles, and stakeholder involvement, through a case study approach based on several international tourism destinations. Management techniques are considered critical to the sustainable stewardship and competitiveness of tourism destinations. The importance of tourism management and monitoring in destinations and organizations is particularly highlighted through an explanation of sustainable tourism indicator systems such as that created by the European Commission. Systems such as this will help position Europe as the leading sustainable tourism destination in the world both now and in the future.

Patrizia Modica is an Associate Professor in Business Economics at the University of Cagliari, Italy, where she also teaches issues relating to the tourism industry. Within the field of tourism, her interests are focused on tourism sustainability. She has authored a number of publications, including the forthcoming book, Sustainable Island Tourism: Seasonality, Competitiveness, and Quality-of-life, CABI Publishing, and has presented at conferences related to the managerial aspect of tourism, including the 2014 OECD-EUROSTAT Conference in Nara, Japan, where she presented the paper, Modeling Economic Monitoring Systems of Tourism Impacts at the Sub-National Level. She is a member of several international associations, including the Travel and Tourism Research Association (TTRA), and is co-founder of Geoprogress, a not-for-profit organization for the development of people and territories.