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Purpose The aim of this study is to evaluate the potential geographic locations for ecotourism activities and to select the best one among alternatives. Design/methodology/approach The proposed model consists of four sequential phases. In the first phase, different geographic criteria are determined based on existing literature, and data are gathered using GIS. On equal criteria weighing, alternative locations are determined using GIS in the second phase. In the third phase, the identified criteria are weighted using analytical hierarchy process (AHP) by various stakeholders of potential ecotourism sites. In the fourth phase, the PROMETHEE method is applied to determine the best alternative based on the weighted criteria. Findings A framework including four sequential steps is proposed. Using real data from the Black Sea region in Turkey, the authors test the applicability of the evaluation approach and compare the best alternative obtained by the proposed method for nine cities in the region. Consequently, west of Sinop, east of Artvin and south of the Black Sea region are determined as very suitable locations for ecotourism. Research limitations/implications The first limitation of the study is considered the number of included criteria. Another limitation is the use of deterministic parameters that do not cope with uncertainty. Further research can be conducted for determining the optimum locations for different types of tourism, e.g. religion tourism, hunting tourism and golf tourism, for effective tourism planning. Practical implications The proposed approach can be applied to all area that cover the considered criteria. The approach has been tested in the Black Sea region (nine cities) in Turkey. Social implications Using the proposed approach, decision-makers can determine locations where environmentally responsible travel to natural areas to enjoy and appreciate nature that promotes conservation have a low visitor impact and provide for beneficially active socioeconomic involvement of local individuals. Originality/value To the best knowledge of the authors, this is the first study which applies a GIS-based multi-criteria decision-making approach for ecotourism site selection.

It is a known fact that basic health care services cannot reach the majority of the population due to poor geographical accessibility. Unless quantitative locationallocation models and geographic information systems (GIS) are used, the final decision may be made on pragmatic considerations which can result far from optimal. In this paper, current and possible (or potential) new locations of pharmacy warehouses in Gaziantep are investigated to provide optimal distribution of hospitals and pharmacies. To do so, first of all, geographic information of 10 current and 10 potential pharmacy warehouses, 231 pharmacies and 29 hospitals are gathered using GIS. Second, a set covering mathematical model is handled to determine coverage capability of current and potential pharmacy warehouses and minimize the number of warehouses to be opened. Finally, P-center and P-median mathematical models are applied to open potential warehouses and to assign pharmacies & hospitals to the opened warehouses so that the total distance and the demand's longest distance to the source are minimized. Developed integer programming (IP) models and GIS software are compared with on a case study. Computational experiments prove that our approach can find new potential pharmacy warehouses which cover wider areas than current warehouses to service pharmacies and hospitals in the city.

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