A TREND ANALYSIS OF ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT ASSESSMENT (EIA) PRACTICE IN NIGERIA AND ITS IMPLICATION TO TOURISM DEVELOPMENT

Thesis Overview

<p> </p><div><b>INTRODUCTION</b></div><div>The environment is important in attracting tourism flows with their attendant economic effects. Conservation of valued environmental features can help in balancing and maintaining tourism visitation and tourism’s contribution to the economy. Tourists, however, can also ‘love the environment to death’, impairing the very thing that attracts them and bringing about its deterioration and destruction. For this reason, satisfactorily resolving this problem is important to the tourist industry, especially given a limited supply of pristine environments and with tourist demand expected to grow in the future (Dwyer et al 2010). Tourism as an industry affects the environment through the interplay with natural (oceans, wildlife habitats, coral reefs etc), human (values, cultural activities etc) and built (ancient ruins, historic towns, monuments, theme parks etc) resources. It is a two-edged sword, however, with the potential for both positive and negative impacts. Hence, with it you can cook your food, and it can also burn down your house when mismanaged.</div><div><br></div><div>The maintenance of tourism as a dynamic rather than a static industry depends to a large extent upon the adoption of a strategic approach to planning and development. The success of such an approach is largely dependent upon a systematic and structured analysis of the broad environmental factors affecting tourism demand as an essential part of the planning process (Theobalt 2001). The world is changing and experiencing shifts in social values that affect the way we act as individuals, businesses and governments. It has been noted that part of the change is an increasing recognition that past growth, and development have led to some serious negative impacts on the environment. Some of them are glaring (shrinking water supplies, homeless garbages), while others seems to be concealed but really constituting nuisance (like the depletion of ozone layer, loss of diversity and global warming) (Murphy and Price 2001).</div><div><br></div><br><div>Tourism as we know is the application of knowledge to the real life situation, which brings about societal development by showcasing a nation’s cultural heritage (as well as natural). This does not mean that tourism is less destructive to the environment than other industries; it has its own cut into the existence of man and his environment. Hence, the need to follow an environmentally compatible pattern of tourism development is now well into its third decade. In spite of the fact that environmental issues are high profile in the development process, little has been achieved to ensure that future development are environmentally sound. It is obvious that any form of industrial development will normally bring impact on the environment in which it takes place. The tourism industry is made up of outputs consumed by the tourists, and their visit to the place of production is often associated with many activities, which have environmental consequences (Cooper et al, 2005).</div><div><br></div><div>Such economic and environmental consequences led many nations, companies and individuals to the June 1992 United Nations Conference on the Environment and Development (UNCED Earth Summit) in Rio de Janeiro. There they attempted to address a controversial agenda designed to protect Earth’s environment and to foster less destructive industrialization and development (Murphy and Price 2006). This Conference brought to the forefront, the need to develop projects in an environmentally friendly way, hence, it introduced the principles of “polluter pays and cradle to the grave”. We should recall that tourism is a highly heterogeneous industry, and different environmental planning tools are applied at different scales and in different jurisdictions. In most countries only certain components of the tourism industry, and particular types of tourism development, are subject to project-scale environmental impact assessment. This incomplete approach to Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) in the industry has affected its effectiveness and this has impinged on the growth of the sector because tourism is a great user of the environment.</div><div><br></div><div>It then suffices to say that the need to carry out EIA prior to any tourism project cannot be over emphasized so as to anticipate the effects of tourism development and provide remedial actions were necessary. Many countries of the world that have benefited from tourism have ended up being blinded by the economic impact of tourism, without paying adequate attention to the environmental impact (which can also be negative as well as positive). Commenting on this, Murphy and Price (2001).....</div> <br><p></p>