SocioCultural Group: Concluding Evaluation of our thoughts on sustainable tourism issues...

What stood out to us the most concerning some of the more important issues that truly affected the sustainable tourism of Costa Rica was the participation that the local community showed towards being aware of the projects, services and national parks thriving in their area that were striving to capture the energy-saving vision to make the environment a more green and healthy place to inhabit. Because people go to Costa Rica to see natural beauty, the people realized how important it was to preserve it. We visited a variety of national parks and there were only a few of the many more they had. Every hotel and business that we visited did an amazing job of conserving energy. There were signs in the bedrooms reminding people to turn off all the lights and air conditioning as they left the rooms. Some places had no air conditioning at all and no TVs to cut down on the amount of energy wasted. There is still plenty of room for improvement, but they are striving on a potentially promising route that could end up with fruitful outcomes.

The system of means of conserving water could possibly be improved to salvage the resources readily available on a persistent basis. The tropical climate of Costa Rica brings torrential rainfalls in the verano (summer) season, which commonly has more rainfall than the invierno (winter) season. If they continue to reap the benefits of saving water through drainage systems or through hydroelectric power, then they could use this for good means.

Since there are such abundant quantities of tourists, sustainability is a very motivating factor for businesses to flourish. Competition is not the issue, it is more that they as a whole wish to contribute and give back to the environment. It perhaps gives them a sense of accomplishment that they are impacting the environment by such positive means. Sustainability was taken to far lengths, to the point where we scrounged about in a restroom for instance to stumble upon the rather unwelcome surprise that there was not any soap or sometimes toilet paper within the vicinity. It is as if they are trying to conserve their resources to the utmost degree, to the point of being unsanitary. Some of the main issues that are essential to being developed.

In the United States a crucial lesson that needs to be learned is that we should consider how much energy is thrown away by careless people who are more concerned with comfort of excessive air conditioning and usage of electricity instead of using natural light. We should spent more time outdoors enjoying the glorious mother nature. We should cease in increasing the ever growing carbon footprint that we are contributing to through the pollution that our seemingly critical daily activities give off.

It’s sad how our children will be deprived of the chance to see the wildlife that we were able to experience because of extinction and not being sustainable. The national parks and the ecosystem need to be cultivated and paid attention to that they are being taken care of and are thriving so that we can pass down the legacy. We believe sustainable tourism is beneficial because of the positive impact it bestows on our future generation.

Sustainability revolves around caring enough about your resources and not taking what you have readily avaliable for granted, using it in a means that is beneficial for the present and future community, and always trying to find ways to improve upon saving energy, giving back to the environment, and managing current resources.