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It’s a common saying on television travel programs: “What a beautiful undiscovered destination, where there is no mass tourism yet. Come here before it’s too late!”

Of course it couldn’t be more paradoxical. By promoting special and unspoilt destinations, visitor numbers can only grow. You just have to hope that the destination can handle and manage these visitor numbers. Unbridled growth leads to negative effects on the destination, which are difficult to solve. Think of environmental pollution, loss of special natural areas, loss of culture and disruption of local life. Who will be the victims of that? Not the big international hotel chains, but the locals. Therefore, sustainable tourism development is essential for the destination to benefit from tourism, rather than being victimized by it. Tourism cuts its own flesh: tourists come for untouched nature and an authentic culture, but affects this nature and culture at the same time. The balance between tourism and nature and culture conservation is very fragile and easy to disrupt. If you want to know more about the effects of tourism on nature and culture, click here .

When you go on holiday, you often end up in paradise: bounty beaches, colorful markets and friendly people. But behind the paradisiacal exterior lurks a dark side: waste problems, pollution, indigenous peoples having to make way for the construction of resorts and poor working conditions for hotel staff. Initiatives are, of course, being taken to steer tourism in the right direction. Here you can look behind the scenes at various destinations. Check the site regularly for new behind-the-scenes stories.

If you look at this page, it seems that tourism only brings negative effects. Nothing is less true. Take a look in the subheading “Do it sustainably”. There we show that there are a lot of initiatives where tourism contributes to nature conservation and poverty alleviation. Click here  if you want to do it sustainably.

Have you been able to look behind the scenes yourself during your holiday? Have you seen with your own eyes that there are also comments to be made about tourism? Or have you experienced that destinations take measures for nature and culture conservation? Share your experiences with us via our contact form and maybe your story will be featured here too!

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