Adopting the dimensions of sustainable tourism
identified by the WTO (environmental, economic,
and socio-cultural), it may be insightful to look at
some of the issues associated with conventional
tourism.
Environmental concerns with conventional
tourism development have a long history and envi-
ronmental consequences have been widely docu-
mented. With the world becoming a smaller and
smaller place for the international traveler, these
concerns are now present on a global scale: from the
visual damage to coastlines due to the construction
of high-rise hotels (e.g. throughout the Mediterra-
nean), to the possibly devastating effect on fragile
ecological systems (e.g. Australia’s Great Barrier
Reef, Latin America’s Amazon rainforest, and the
ice plains of Antarctica).