Abstract:
Ecotourism is nature-based tourism, which involves enjoying nature, understanding local
environment and culture. At the same time, ecotourism demands conservation of nature
and improvement of local communities to make the environment and tourism sustainable.
Thus ecotourism can be viewed as a panacea. But, in real world the actual performance of
ecotourism make huge controversies. An ecotourism site, having full sustainability and
complete conservation of all living and nonliving resources, is a very rare case. Deciding
ecotourism activities for a particular area is a quite complex job and deserves subjective
judgment. Land suitability analysis for ecotourism activities has similar effect, the
complex decision making process. A lot of natural, environmental, social and economic
factors influence the site selection for ecotourism activities. Experts from different
backgrounds need to be involved in the site selection process. Furthermore, such decision
making process should have consistency to get more accurate decision. The aim of this
study is thus, to find suitable locations for ecotourism development in Cox’s Bazar,
Bangladesh.
To fulfil this aim at first resource maps were prepared based on general landuse classes.
Then, within the area of those resource maps potential ecotourism sites were identified
and ranked using Geographical Information System (GIS) and Analytical Hierarchy
Process (AHP). AHP technique was used as this is a very useful technique to make
subjective and consistent judgment as well as help to make ranking of decision choices.
Five factors and fifteen criteria were identified to evaluate suitability of sites. Factors and
criteria were selected based on literature review, local knowledge and expert’s opinions.
After ranking the suitable locations, the study result shows 76.32 sq. km (9%) area as
highly suitable, 499.41 sq. km (56%) area as moderately suitable and 189 sq. km (21%)
area as minimum suitable for ecotourism development in the study area. Also, another
124.65 sq. km (14%) area was found unsuitable for ecotourism for its highly agricultural
and urban landuse. The highly suitable areas are characterized by hilly forest, most of
the growth centres fall within the moderately suitable areas and minimum suitable areas
are predominated by rural agricultural land. Based on research findings some strategic recommendations have been suggested at the
regional level. Major recommendations aimed at treating the highly suitable area as more
‘natural’ and for bringing them under conservation programs, creating tourist facilities in
the moderately suitable areas by targeting growth centres and protecting agricultural land
and encouraging local primary activities in the minimum suitable areas.
