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Local communities are often encouraged to adopt alternative land-use practices to minimize their impacts on biodiversity. Tourism is one of these practices but it can also impact conservation and traditional resource use activities. Using a review of the International Union for Conservation of Nature Red List database as well as nature-based tourism, ethnozoology, ethnobiology, and wildlife conservation and trade literature, we examined the influence of tourism on the traditional resource use–conservation balance and the potential outcomes for species conservation. We identified 547 local culturally important species (LCIS): 369 were threatened by traditional practices (e.g., hunting) and 161 were protected (e.g., totemic species). Most LCIS were found in the Indomalayan, Neotropical, and Afrotropical regions and roughly 30% were involved in nature-based tourism, particularly mammals. Very few LCIS (<5) were threatened by tourism. Results suggested that tourism can support species conservation and protect traditional practices by providing alternative local sustainable development options. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The Pacific region has high levels of endemism and contains three of the world's global biodiversity hotspots. Despite its conservation significance, the region faces difficulties in protecting its biodiversity primarily due to restricted knowledge, limited local capacity and financial constraints. Tourism has been increasingly promoted in the region as a means of promoting and financing conservation activities. To date however, there have been few studies looking at the impacts of increasing tourism on biodiversity in the Pacific. This paper reviews publicly available data on the contribution of tourism to the threatened status of Pacific biodiversity. The ∼1900 IUCN Red listed species in the region are threatened by a number of factors that can be grouped into four major processes; habitat loss (55%), overexploitation (32%), invasive species (22%) and pollution (14%). Tourism, as a specific threatening process, affects 15% of all assessed listed species with its impacts more apparent in countries with relatively large and significant tourism industries. Most of the individual species reported as threatened by tourism are corals (83%). Terrestrial species may be equally threatened but the absence of National Lists of threatened species and incomplete IUCN Red Lists for all countries in the region highlights significant knowledge gaps making it difficult to fully assess the impacts of tourism on all taxa. While sustainable tourism development currently appears to be a suitable income-generating and conservation-promoting activity in the region, the short and long-term impacts of this development must be carefully monitored and addressed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The independent island nations of the South Pacific have a rich and threatened terrestrial biota. Despite considerable investment of resources into conservation over the last three decades, biodiversity is dwindling and protected area systems remain inadequate. This lack of success is caused by important differences in cultural, economic, landownership, and social factors in developing Pacific Island countries, compared to developed nations that often fund conservation programs and plans. Despite the obvious need for capacity building and information exchange among stakeholders, little collaboration and development has eventuated. A coordinated and integrated approach, focusing conservation resources on national priorities, is essential to achieve efficient conservation. This will need to include active involvement of landowners, a good sociocultural understanding of target communities, improved collaboration between the various stakeholders, provision of sustainable alternative economic activities, and a commitment to long funding cycles for projects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]