Millions of people take vacations each year, whether to other cities or countries. It is a common goal among avid travelers to visit as many countries as possible, so they can continue to cross them off their bucket list. Traveling to different countries, whether in Europe, Asia, or the Caribbean, can be a valuable learning experience as you meet new people and experience a new culture. On the other hand, tourism isn’t always sunshine and rainbows; the environment and local communities often bear the brunt of tourism. Locals are forcibly displaced from their homes so that hotels and resorts can be built on top of their ancestral lands, leaving them with nowhere to go. Animals suffer from habitat loss when companies deforest large areas of land. Tourism is unethical because it has a negative impact on native communities and harms the environment.
Countries around the world attract millions of tourists each year. In 2024, over 1.4 billion people travelled internationally. Many of these tourists choose the most popular destinations, such as European countries, which receive the highest number of tourists compared to any other region. The top tourist destinations around the world include France, which attracts around 90 million visitors annually, Spain, with approximately 83 million visitors, and the United States, which receives around 79 million visitors. Many of these vacationers come to these countries because they give them a chance to explore diverse cultures, try new and unfamiliar cuisine, and visit sights that they may have been eyeing for a while. We all like to go on a vacation every once in a while, and they’re an amazing way to relax and take your mind off of school or work responsibilities, but most don’t think about the potential damage that they might be causing.
There are many factors to consider when examining the causes of environmental problems, but tourism is one of the primary ones. With construction companies building resorts and depleting natural resources, soil erosion occurs, habitats are destroyed, and water sources are depleted or polluted. Although water is a scarce resource in many countries, it has become a necessity for big resorts to run successfully. These resorts utilize water for swimming pools, golf courses, and other services such as restaurants and hotel utilities.
The Caribbean is a particularly popular region that attracts over 30 million visitors each year (Caribbean Tourism Organization), a number that is only expected to increase as its popularity continues to grow on social media. Although their economy is almost entirely driven by tourism, the UN reports that 80% of all money generated from tourism in the Caribbean does not stay on the islands, but is distributed to countries outside of the region.
As of 2019, Caribbean islands have been experiencing a water crisis and are among the most “water-stressed” countries in the world, according to the Latin America and Caribbean Regional Water Action Dialogue. Many of these countries ration water during times like these, and when it comes time to allocate these water resources, resorts often receive priority over citizens living in the area. Due to the limited availability of freshwater, urban industries usually rely on already scarce water sources.
The environmental issue also includes pollution from big tourist industries and travelers themselves. Air emissions, improper waste disposal, and noisy vehicles contribute to the issue. Air pollution originates from industrial buildings that burn fossil fuels, but aviation also contributes to the problem. The increasing air travel of recent years is only likely to harm the environment and exacerbate global warming. The aviation industry accounts for 2.5% of all greenhouse gas emissions annually, and this figure is expected to continue growing (Hannah Ritchie).
The issue of improper waste disposal is also a big concern. The European Commission reports that tourists produce around twice as much trash as citizens in a country. Landfills in countries with high tourist rates struggle to dispose of waste in their actual landfills. Tourists who go on trips into the mountains, especially in countries like Nepal, often leave behind their trash, which eventually accumulates and becomes a significant issue. Non-profit organizations frequently clean up these mountains, but they can’t keep up with the number of tourists who trash the mountains on each expedition. Additionally, sewage and other toxic chemicals produced by hotels and cruise liners can enter the water and pollute oceans and river systems, rendering some freshwater resources unusable.
What many people don’t consider is the impact of factors like deforestation and noise pollution on wildlife. Industries destroy thousands of forests so that they can build golf courses and hotels over them. This can leave animals without habitats and nowhere to go. Noise pollution from vehicles and construction disturbs animals and often disrupts breeding and migration patterns. Vacationers who feed or touch animals unknowingly are putting the animals at risk of contracting diseases from bacteria transmitted through their hands. It is best to avoid interacting with species that you may encounter in the wild to minimize disruption.
More concerningly, many local communities are also severely affected by the impacts of tourism. Families are kicked out of their homes and displaced so that resorts and hotels can be built on top of the land that they lived on before. This is especially an issue in countries like Jamaica, which is a very popular tourist destination. Tuff Gong Worldwide follows the story of a Jamaican man, Norris Arscott, as he navigates his fishing career after being banned from the beach he had been fishing from for 70 years of his life. Many fishermen like Arscott have been restricted from accessing the local beach because a company bought out the land and built a physical wall surrounding the property in hopes of another resort on top of the beach. No longer having access to it, Arscott is forced to travel six miles to the closest beach on a bike every day to catch fish and make a profit. His neighbor, Damion Coombs, who also fished at the same beach and is now forced elsewhere, says that low-income is now common among fishermen. The closing of these beaches means that many of them have also lost their jobs. Many locals obtain their jobs from hotels, which may seem like a positive solution to the problem; however, many of these workers take on these jobs because they have lost their previous independence selling apparel or fish. The livelihoods of local communities are destroyed by these industries due to a lack of jobs and displacement.
The issue lies within sustainability. With pollution decimating environments, urbanization draining resources, and tourist companies displacing locals from the land they’ve lived on their entire lives, it seems to be only getting worse if it is not addressed as soon as possible. While it is a great feat to get governments to not just focus on the money, but to care about the well-being of their communities genuinely, it is now up to us as individuals to be mindful of how we travel when visiting other countries. There is only one thing that you truly need to tour sustainably: education. Educating yourself on customs and even the language can help you have a better experience, and it makes locals feel more respected. Another thing that you can do is to support local businesses rather than big corporations. They are already disenfranchised by companies, so shopping from local markets can help support families that may be economically oppressed. Sustainable tourism is something that we should all strive for, and if we all contribute every way that we can, we can hope for a better future for communities all over the world that are affected by it.
