Assessing the impacts of ecotourism activities on riparian health indicators along the Three Gorges Reservoir in China

Abstract

Ecotourism activities in riparian zones have heightened concern about protecting riparian health indicators (RHIs). Ecotourism in riparian zones is growing significantly, but its management requires trade-offs between recreational activities and ecological functions. This paper aims to show how people's recreational activities affect RHIs along mega-reservoirs and around dams. Investigators collected data from 301 transects inside the riparian zones of the Three Gorges Dam Reservoir (TGDR) in China, taking rural, rural–urban transitional, and urban land-use patterns into account. The Kruskal-Wallis tests (p < 0.01) found that the RHI index was significantly greater than the recreational activity and value index along the TGDR, with the RHI index being higher in the transitional basins. The Pearson correlation tests (p < 0.05) revealed that recreational activities were associated with both positive and negative aspects of RHIs, with significant correlations ranging from low to moderate. The key factors of ecotourism and RHIs determined by principal component analysis explained 65.36 % of the total variation. Furthermore, hierarchical cluster analysis revealed that these characteristics were distributed differently in rural, rural–urban transitional, and urban land-use patterns. Findings indicated that zoning might be an essential option for the long-term use of riparian zone ecosystem services around water resources. Consequently, people should be made aware of the importance of RHIs, and governments should support progressive policies that lead to a change in attitudes and actions towards RHIs conservation.

Keywords

• Tourism management
• Ecological indicators
• Riparian zone
• Yangtze River
• Three Gorges Dam
• Water resource conservation