Stakeholders’ Attitudes toward Protected Areas: The Case of Tara National Park (Serbia)

Abstract

This paper represents a case study examining attitudes of various stakeholders about Tara National Park (NP) (Serbia), identifying also the factors that shape these attitudes. The survey method was applied to a sample of 405 respondents (197 community members and 208 visitors). In addition, 15 interviews with specific key actors (NP executives and local key persons) were performed. The research confirmed the presence of different types of conflicts among stakeholders, mostly between the NP and the local population (primarily farmers) associated with land use in agriculture and the ban on the construction of facilities. The community recognizes tourism as the highest priority, unlike the NP leaders and visitors, who emphasize protection and conservation (especially biodiversity) as the primary goals of future NP development. The opinions of the local population are divided concerning support for the existence of the NP and the importance of it as a part of the national heritage. Most of them do not recognize the economic benefits resulting from the proclamation of the NP and do not see themselves as participants in the decision-making process. The findings also reveal that visitors strongly support tourism development and activities following the principles of nature protection. This category of respondents is only partly affected by the fact that this area has been declared a NP. The analysis shows that certain socioeconomic factors considerably influence the opinions of both community and visitors. Results suggest that future actions should be aimed at improving the coordination of various stakeholders, especially the NP and the community, through different social mobilization activities. Stimulating small businesses and providing incentives for agriculture and nature tourism development could be a useful step forward.

Attitudes of local people towards Apuseni Nature Park, Romania

“…As for the economic questions, we can feel a kind of optimism, and the proportion of inhabitants who would like to move away from their settlement is equal or less than in similar surveys conducted in other karst areas. For instance, the proportion of locals who would move away from the Slovak Karst was between 23.0 and 55.0 percent, depending on their attitude cluster (Nestorová Dická, J. et al 2020), 37.0 percent for Aggtelek karst (Telbisz, T. et al 2018), and 36.0 percent for Tara National Park in Serbia (Brankov, J. et al 2022). However, when speaking about the park, the balance tilts towards the negative opinions.…”

Drina Transboundary Biosphere Reserve—Opportunities and Challenges of Sustainable Conservation

“…The diverse karst morphology of the area is presented [33,34], the water potential of the Drina River is emphasized [26,[35][36][37][38][39] along with biodiversity [36,38,40] and cultural and historical heritage [36,40]. The area has been analyzed from the aspect of tourism potential [10,38,[40][41][42], as well as spatial planning solutions [43,44], where its significance in cross-border planning [11,45,46] is particularly highlighted.…”

Protected Natural Areas and Ecotourism—Priority Strategies for Future Development in Selected Serbian Case Studies

“…Also, the extremely restrictive concept of using natural resources causes non-compliance with existing legal regulations and the emergence of conflicts between the protected area and the local community. Similar to other protected areas in the country, these conflicts are most often related to illegal construction and land use and affect the sustainable development of the local population [90].…”