Sustainable management of natural assets used for tourism in New Zealand : a classification system, management guidelines and indicators

Nature and recreation based activities are significant components of the tourism industry in New Zealand. Growing numbers of visitors, and the needs of statutory resource managers, have placed pressure on tourism operators and providers to effectively avoid, remedy and/or mitigate existing and potential effects of tourism. At the same time there is also pressure to provide a quality visitor experience and to operate tourism enterprises profitably. Although a major review and investigation into the environmental effects associated with the tourism sector was carried out by the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment (PCE) in 1997, standard tools for identifying and monitoring visitor impacts, and generic guidelines for management, are currently not widely applied or available to many operators. In this report we develop and apply a framework for the integrated management of natural assets used for tourism. We concentrate in particular on developing three related products: 1) a simple and applied tourism asset classification framework; 2) a framework for sustainable management of natural assets incorporating management and monitoring guidelines; and 3) a set of Environmental Performance Indicators for Natural Assets used for Tourism consistent with other sets being developed by the Ministry for the Environment