“Community-Based Ecotourism in Laos: Benefits  and Burdens Sharing among Stakeholders”

Problem description
Research project
Project team

Problem description

Ecotourism has been regarded as a tool for socio-economic development and promote conservation of cultural and natural resources. The government of many developing countries including Lao PDR is focusing attention on the development of ecotourism in the rural areas, especially in the protected areas in the hope that it will create employment opportunities and raise income for local people. These will lead to increase in living standard and bring them out of poverty trap. Ecotourism is also expected to contribute financial resource for conservation activities. However, the findings from previous researches indicate that local communities receive minimal benefits from tourism and furthermore the distribution of the benefits is unequal among tourism stakeholders. In some cases, ecotourism activities exacerbate environmental degradation in protected areas. Therefore, this study will address the problems associated with benefits/burden sharing among stakeholders and how ecotourism contribute to safeguard fragile ecosystem.

Research project

The overall objective of this project is to examine the benefits/burden sharing among stakeholders from the development of ecotourism in Laos PDR and further to investigate how ecotourism has contributed to the conservation activities in the protected areas. The research will be conducted in protected areas located in Northern and Central Laos where ecotourism plays an important role in socio-economic development of the communities living in and at the adjacent areas of these national parks.

Project team

phd-student: Ounmany Kiengkay, MBA
supervisor: Muhar Andreas, Ao. Univ.-Prof. Dipl.-Ing. Dr. nat.techn.
co-supervisor: Penker Marianne, Ao.Univ.Prof. Dipl.-Ing. Dr.