Assessment of the sustainability of tourism service providers in the tayrona national natural park, department of magdalena, Colombia

Abstract

The article presents a sustainability assessment model for the tourism service providers (tsp) operating in the Tayrona National Natural Park, Magdalena, Colombia. The review of good practices experiences of tourism service providers in natural parks made it possible to develop the quantitative research to assess the sustainability of tsp on the basis of the construction of a weighted sum index statistical model. 157 good practices were analyzed, the results showed that 9.1% of the tsp have a high sustainability index, while 27.3% of them have a low index. In conclusion, the legal mechanism of concessions is not the ideal management strategy nor are tsp the best option in terms of implementing best practices.