Page 202 - ce_cusco_2019

industry relies on. To do this both government and private sector organizations have taken steps to protect

biodiversity from tourists. A National Strategic Plan for Tourism was created in 2005, and organizations like

PromPeru has helped to promote conservation of natural and cultural resources (McCool & Moisey, 2009).

However, there are not many procedures in place to monitor and prevent both the immediate and lasting

effects of tourists at the moment, and this is crucial to creating a sustainable ecotourism industry for Peru.

Tourists have become a crucial part of the economy in Peru, and have provided the country many

positive opportunities and growth. However, the effects of tourists have led to irrefutable damage to the

country’s vast biodiversity. While ecotourism cannot and will not go away anytime soon, Peru must learn to

deal with these negative effects in a way that helps conserve their biodiversity while at the same time sharing

it sustainably. As it stands, tourists present a much greater threat to the biodiversity of Peru than it seems, due

to the fact that they act as an invasive species. Although they may not claim official status as an invasive

species at the moment, tourists meet many of the criteria of an invasive species, possibly more than some

species officially regarded as invasive. The multidimensional forms of invasiveness allow for an abstract view

on invasive species that could and should include tourists. But regardless of tourists’ and humans’ official

status as an invasive species, it is vital to the conservation of Peru’s biodiversity that they be treated as such in

order to be responsible actors in conservation and sustainable ecotourism.

202