Sustainability and Destination Management From Czech Perspectives

Abstract

The aim of destination management is to deploy resources to be competitive, and to steward destination resources to be sustainable (Ritchie & Crouch, 2006). The former is about the ability to compete in the tourism market, and the latter is about the ability to maintain the quality of physical, social, cultural, and environmental resources while competing in the tourism market. Mowforth and Munt (2009) present key techniques in sustainable tourism, e.g. environmental impact assessment, carrying capacity calculations, limits of acceptable change, area protection or visitor management techniques. Concerning sustainable tourism, further technique is the elimination of negative externalities through their internationalization (Bieger, 2000). Nevertheless, the fundamental tool of destination management is the strategy of sustainable tourism development. This paper focuses on the application of the above mentioned techniques for managing sustainability in the Czech practice. The research identifies the most used techniques with respect to the impacts induced by tourism development in the destination. Moreover, the research reveals the obstacles to applying certain techniques. Purpose: The reason for running the research is to discover to what extent the Czech destination management organisations (DMOs) reflect sustainability in their destination management. Thus, the research converges to the application of techniques and tools available to sustainable tourism development in practice. Design/methodology/approach: To demonstrate the diversity of tourism impacts on environment, the sample of the research includes the Czech DMOs that are located in different types of destinations (urban, mountain, rural). Questionnaires are used for collecting data. Firstly, DMOs assess the social, economic and environmental impacts that occur in their destination. Then they identify these techniques and tools that they apply to eliminate the impacts. And furthermore, DMOs state the reason why they do not use a certain technique or tool. The gathered data are processed by statistical methods. Findings:The key finding is that the most used visitor management technique is information signing. Development strategy and monitoring of customers' satisfaction are done in partnership. A positive result is that DMOs are willing to cooperate with impacts initiators to improve the situation in the destination. The major obstacle is the lack of financial resources for applying certain techniques. DMOs also argue that there is strong unwillingness of entrepreneurs to participate in sustainable tourism development. Research limitations:The results can be influenced by the subjective perception of the DMOs representatives when assessing destination impacts and used techniques for managing sustainability in their destination. Another limitation is timing. The results demonstrate the situation before the COVID-19 pandemic. Practical implications: Regardless of the COVID-19 pandemic, DMOs can take advantage of the research to update their destination strat...