Tourism and the Environment in the Caribbean : An Economic Framework
While tourism is one of the most important economic activities in the Caribbean, its reliance is based uniquely on the natural environment, indicating the resource base upon which all of this economic activity is based, is however fragile. Thus, su...
| Main Authors: | , , , |
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| Format: | Working Paper |
| Language: | English en_US |
| Published: |
World Bank, Washington, DC
2014
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/2001/03/1570699/tourism-environment-caribbean-economic-framework http://hdl.handle.net/10986/18299 |
| Summary: | While tourism is one of the most
important economic activities in the Caribbean, its reliance
is based uniquely on the natural environment, indicating the
resource base upon which all of this economic activity is
based, is however fragile. Thus, sustainable tourism, and
its economic benefits require ensuring that the
environmental resources the sector relies on, are managed
responsibly by the countries of the Caribbean, the
tourism/travel industry, and the visitors themselves. The
study examines the links between tourism, and environment,
pointing at the magnitude of environmental threats, and the
role of information, at creating strong incentives,
addressing environmental problems certification schemes, to
allow credible advertisement of its environmental quality.
Capturing tourism economic "rents" - defined as an
excess return to an asset - is viewed as a policy question
for governments, on how to use these rents effectively.
Mechanisms to capture rents include charging user fees when
accessing a particular environmental resource, however, when
environmental resources are public goods, user fees do not
provide a practical means of capturing generated rents, thus
more general taxation schemes are required. Based on this
analysis, recommendations include the establishment of
corporate income taxes, and moderate tariff rates for
tourism inputs, establishing taxation, to be partly, and
explicitly identified for environmental, and/or resource
user fees. |
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