Forces of nature

Forces of nature

COLUMN: Banff Ideas Bank — What is voluntourism? - Banff Crag and Canyon - Alberta, CA

Banff Ideas Bank — What is voluntourism? - Banff Crag and Canyon - Alberta, CA

Socio-cultural sustainability of Volunteer Tourism ( abstract for upcoming publication )

Tourism is one of the main industries worldwide and contributes significantly to the economic development of many communities. However, tourism is dependent on environmental and socio-cultural resources. Any tourism development must therefore take into consideration the availability of these resources and the nature of the tourism industry’s dependence on them.

Voltourism; (volunteer tourism), a complex form of tourism, is becoming more popular. The market of voltourism experience suppliers is growing as well. In order to evaluate how voltourism development can change people’s lives it is essential to understand how voltourism impacts them. Voltourism development plays a major role in shaping destination societies and altering the lives of the host communities. 

With the increase of alternative types of tourism, there has been an understandable increase in voltourism. While tourism development must include the interests of the local community and consider their interests to be a main part of the development process, voltourism has an even more direct and deeper relationship between tourists and local communities. Also, social and cultural issues are taken into account by voltourism. This form of tourism encourages contributing to the host society and promotes sustainability. In this paper, I will be demonstrating the socio-cultural sustainability of voltourism as outlined in some of the literature to date. Through this literature review I will present the conceptual background of voltourism, definitions of social and cultural sustainability in voltourism, the positive and negative impacts of voltourism, and the future role of voltourism throughout developing countries which are the usual destinations of voltourism.