Sustainability Education for Tourists

Abstract

Tourists are a key stakeholder group that must be considered in any discussion of education for sustainability (EfS) in tourism. There are two main dimensions to this discussion—educating tourists to support the management of their impacts on the destination and using tourist experiences as an opportunity for EfS more broadly. This chapter identifies points of communication between tourism actors and tourists which could be used for EfS in tourism. It then reviews two main types of communication—heritage interpretation and destination marketing and outlines how these two processes will need to change to support EfS in tourism. Tourism could be an opportunity to educate people about global sustainability issues and encourage them to change their behaviours while at the destination, when they travel in the future and when they return to their everyday lives at home. To realise this opportunity will, however, require fundamental change in the processes of interpretation and destination marketing.