Tourism cannot survive without environment and environment needs human support to sustain itself. Today tourism is a growing industry. It brings in a lot of money and a lot of countries economies flourish because tourism is their asset. There are two major reasons why a country is successful as a tourist destination. One the quality of places where nature runs wild are very good and the facilities that help one to encash the real juice of this nature.

The facilities made available for making a tourists' visit a natural place comfortable is the main reason why environment is negatively affected. Sometimes the tourism industry overlooks their own capacity of accommodating tourists and the price has to be paid by the environment and natural resources. In these cases environment is exploited to no extent. Of course the hosts mint money but that happens at expense of nature and its goodness.

A few areas affected badly due to adventure intervening with environment are as follows:

• The modernization of a natural place, e.g. running jeeps in sanctuaries can pollute the fresh air.

• Resorts at places which are not meant to be inhabited are reasons for disruption of normal environment. That happens by noise pollution caused by humans and air pollutions due to smoke and fire.

• When tourists dispose of their useless waste they create land pollution. The waste is not always recycle-able which creates more problems.

• Environment is grossly affected when people go right in the middle of it and make it their playground. Resorts are the biggest culprits as they try and create an artificial environment in a natural arrangement.

• People hire cars at beaches, deserts even while they have to transfer for one place to another. That alone causes so much of harm to the environment.

• Adventure acts give rise to employment but not the kinds which could feed a family well. In fact there is not much scope for people at laborers position working in this industry to grow and thrive.

• There is no job security; no health benefits, no safety rules and people have to work entirely relying on their own experiences.

• Even hiring skilled people for a particular kind of tour is not very famous. This might lead to accidents of inexperienced workers in the long run.

• Adventure industry is also run by bureaucracy rules. A land owned by a particular elite family is worked upon only according to their rules and instructions. In this case the responsibility of maintaining the land and conserving it depends solely on them.

The hunger of countries to be a step ahead of others in the money game makes its citizens pay heavy prices. Exploitation of environment is not the only drawback that is highlighted by tourism but even the locals who live near the tourist places are affected by such infliction. If we go on exploiting the environment without returning back what is due there will come a day that the very base on which this industry stands will disappear. Tourism industry needs to understand that cost of loosing environment is too heavy and the loss is irreversible!

About the Author:

THRILLOPHILIA deals with adventure-related activities on a pan-India level. Be its Rafting in the Tons or in the Kali River at Dandeli, Camel Safari in Ladakh or in the Thar Desert, Trekking around Bangalore or Ladakh, Scuba Diving in Lakshadweep or Andaman, we cater it all. We also have some fabulous Biking trips, Caving, Wildlife, Paragliding and many more adrenaline pumping adventure sports. India, having varied landscapes happens to be one of the finest destinations in the world for adventure.

Author: Prashant Jain