Volume: 15  Number: 5  Page: 503–519  doi:10.2167/jost713.0

Environmental-Economic Measures of Tourism Yield

S. Lundiea, L. Dwyera and P. Forsythb aUniversity of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia and bDepartment of Economics, Monash University, Clayton, Australia

A focus on ‘tourism yield’ is an important aspect of business strategies to maintain and enhance destination competitiveness. Ideally the notion of ‘tourism yield’ should include tourism's environmental and social value to a destination in addition to economic value. This paper attempts to develop measures of economic and environmental yield. It first describes how measures of economic yield may be estimated and presents results for Australian inbound tourism. Environmental yield estimates are then developed for the same visitor markets. A hybrid approach is employed, combining input--output analysis with an onsite audit for tourist accommodation. The relevant environmental impacts include those on energy use, water use, greenhouse gas emissions and ecological footprint. The findings reveal that, for some inbound markets, simultaneous achievement of relatively high economic and environmental goals is not possible, and that economic-environmental tradeoffs may be necessary. The results have implications for all destinations which use notions of ‘tourism yield’ to inform their marketing strategies.

Keywords: tourism yield, environmental indicators, economic impact, Australian inbound tourism

Copyright © 2007 S. Lundie et al.

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