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Measuring the ecological footprint of inbound and outbound tourists: evidence from a panel of 35 countries

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Abstract

The ecological footprint of tourism is imperative to assess for United Nation’s environmental sustainable agenda that is provoked for healthy visitation of tourists without damaging natural environment. This would ultimately reap economic and environmental benefits to sustained international tourism. This study examined the relationship between international tourism indicators, air pollutants, and ecological biodiversity underlying the premises of environmental Kuznets curve in the panel of 35 tourists-induced countries for the period of 1995–2016. The study used panel fixed effect and panel two-stage least square regression technique for robust inferences. The results confirmed the following key points, i.e., (1) the U-shaped relationship found between inbound tourists and mono-nitrogen oxide (NOx), where inbound tourists initially do not emanate the NOx emissions, while at the later stages, the level of NOx emissions substantially raises the required strong policy intervention to reduce emissions and provide tourists safe and healthy destinations, (2) inbound tourists linked with the biodiversity loss, and it increases carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in a panel of countries, (3) trade openness affects ecological footprint and potential habitat area, while it decreases NOx and SO2 emissions, (4) international tourists’ departure exercised the ‘rebound effect’ on the ecosystem and air pollutants across countries, (5) there is a monotonic increasing relationship between outbound tourists and ecological footprint, while there is a flat/no relationship between outbound tourists, NOx, CO2, SO2, and GHG emissions, and (6) the food management practices supported the ecological diversity, and it reduces the carbon ‘foodprint,’ while it substantially increases SO2 emissions in outbound tourists’ model. The study emphasized the need for sustainable tourism infrastructure that conserves our natural environment and reduces climatic variability across the globe.

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Fig. 1

Source: UNEP (2016) and World Bank (2017)

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Abbreviations

EKC:

Environmental Kuznets curve

EEA:

European Environment Agency

CO2 emissions:

Carbon dioxide emissions

SO2 emissions:

Sulphur dioxide emissions

PM10 :

Particulate matter 10 μm

LCA:

Life cycle assessment

EFI:

Ecological Footprint Index

EES:

Efficient energy saving

LMDI:

Logarithmic Mean Divisia Index

EECCB:

Energy efficiency in Chinese commercial building

NOx emissions:

Mono-nitrogen oxides

GHG emissions:

Greenhouse gas emissions

ECO_FP:

Ecological footprint

F_AREA:

Forest area

INT_INBOUND:

International inbound tourism

INT-OUTBOUND:

International outbound tourism

WOOD_FUEL:

Wood fuel

TRD_OPEN:

Trade openness

PHH:

Pollution haven hypothesis

ADF:

Augmented Dickey–Fuller

IPS:

Im, Pesaran, and Shin

PP test:

Philips Perron test

LLC:

Levin, Lin, and Chu test

UNEP:

United Nations Environment Programme

FE:

Fixed effect model

2SLS:

Two-stage least squares

SDGs:

Sustainable development goals

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Funding

Funding was provided by Deanship of Scientific Research, King Saud University (Grant No. RG-1439-015).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Faculty of Technology Management and Technopreneurship, Universiti Teknikal Malaysia Melaka, Melaka, Malaysia

    Muhammad Imran Qureshi

  2. Arriyadh Community College, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

    Elsayed Elsherbini Elashkar & Alaa Mohamd Shoukry

  3. KSA workers University, Cairo, Egypt

    Alaa Mohamd Shoukry

  4. Department of Management, FATA University, FR Kohat, Pakistan

    Alamzeb Aamir

  5. Razak School of Engineering and Advanced Technology, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

    Nik Hasnaa Nik Mahmood

  6. Sumait University, Zanzibar, Tanzania

    Amran Md. Rasli

  7. Department of Economics, University of Wah, Quaid Avenue, Wah Cantt, Pakistan

    Khalid Zaman

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  1. Muhammad Imran Qureshi
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  2. Elsayed Elsherbini Elashkar
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  3. Alaa Mohamd Shoukry
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  7. Khalid Zaman
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Correspondence to Muhammad Imran Qureshi.

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Appendix

Appendix

See Tables 7 and 8.

Table 7 Sample countries.
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Table 8 Descriptive statistics.
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Qureshi, M.I., Elashkar, E.E., Shoukry, A.M. et al. Measuring the ecological footprint of inbound and outbound tourists: evidence from a panel of 35 countries. Clean Techn Environ Policy 21, 1949–1967 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10098-019-01720-1

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