A socio-ecological study on the management of ecosystems for tourism has been conducted in the regional park of the Camargue between March and September 2010. It is part of a joint Franco-Israeli study to compare two priority sites for the Mediterranean Wetlands Observatory- the Hula in Israel and the Camargue in France.
The Camargue is a wetland consisting of three characteristic belts . The natural belt is the main zone of protection with a 13000 ha natural reserve. The peripheral belt of intensive protection is characterised by salt production, and agriculture mainly rice growing. Between the two, the belt of extensive uses includes touristic activities, breeding bulls and horses, the use of reed beds and protected areas for conservation. With over one million visitors per year, tourism and agriculture are the Camargue’s most important economic activities. Beach tourism is the largest attraction in the Camargue, followed by cultural tourism in the nearby cities of Arles and Saintes-Maries-de-la Mer. Finally, nature tourism and agro-tourism are more important in the belt of multiple uses. The main actors in the tourism industry are the managers of protected natural areas, the managers for agro-pastoral areas, public bodies (municipalities, tourist offices) and users of the beaches who go camping and kite-surfing.
Thirty semi-structured interviews conducted with these actors helped to highlight the issues that arise from the development of tourism for the maintenance of common socio-economic activities of nature conservation and breeding. We have shown that the way natural areas are developed in order to optimize tourism may conflict with the objectives of local actors, such as nature protection. Local actors particularly state the disturbance of wildlife and the degradation of the beaches. However, specific management arrangements can take into account and offset the potential conflicts of the impact of receiving the public in such areas and the ecosystem services provided by the various ecosystems of the Camargue. For example, to regulate the impact of tourism, local actors have defined (empirically) the carrying capacity of the sites that are open to the public. The beaches are an exception: public authorities have not established a clear strategy regarding free camping, which is very prevalent in the long stretches of beach in the Camargue, which in turn leads to a degradation of the beach, the dunes and their associated ecosystem services. Therefore, the socio-ecological study on tourism shows a strong link between the terms of use of the natural environment and the state of the ecosystem.
