Sun and beach tourism: Tourism impact on the ecosystems of Ayangue commune, to improve the management of tourism activity in the province of Santa Elena

Abstract

The Ayangue town located in the province of Santa Elena has focused on the tourism development, resulting in the massive arrival of tourists, generating an increase in tents and cabins in the beach area, causing an inadequate management of solid waste by tourism service providers, harmful environmental practices by formal and informal vendors, the demand for bio-aquatic resources to feed tourists and residents; and, the indiscriminate use of natural resources in the tourist activities. The objective of this research was to analyze the incidence of the beach season tourism in the community's ecosystems. The method used was the analytical one, the information was gathered in situ by applying surveys to visitors and tourism service providers; For the calculation of these data, non-probabilistic sampling was used; The evaluation of environmental and tourism factors was also carried out with the use of the cause -effect Leopold matrix. The results showed that tourism in Ayangue generates highly negative impact connected to habitat changes, loss of dry forest, significant and depreciable impacts linked to the expansion and creation of tourism infrastructure and the extraction of bio-aquatic resources to satisfy the number of visitors