**2.5. Ecotourism certification**

Matysek and Kriwoken [67] conducted a study to assess the nature and ecotourism program in Tasmania with the help of in-depth structured interviews with a key informant group of operators, industry representatives, government officials and academics. A qualitative research was conducted on an individual and personalized basis.

Catibog-Sinha and Wen, [28] conducted a study in Xishuangbanna Biosphere Reserve (XBR), South China to assess the importance of effective tourism planning and management through the integration of the social, economic and environmental goals. The study focuses on the planning stage of the 7Es model, Environment, Economics, Enforcement, Experience, Engage‐ ment, Enquiry and Education.

Chung [68] conducted a study in Hong Kong to assess the problem of implementing interna‐ tional ecotourism certification at local level with the help of face-to-face interviews, teleinterviews and mailed-questionnaires. The views of stakeholders on international certification for ecotourism in Hong Kong were diversified.

Deng et al. [69] conducted a study in West Virginia to create a point evaluation system to rate and rank forest-based ecotourism areas in West Virginia, USA based on input from academics and ecotourism operators using the Delphi method. It involved one hundred ecotourism academics and sixty one ecotourism operators. Twelve criteria having several indicators were pre-identified from the literature while criteria and associated indicators in the second round were redesigned to reflect the destination conditions and the destination management.

Deng and Selin [70] conducted a study for the development of a point evaluation system for ecotourism destinations. It involves first round of panel discussion for generation of ideas and the second round for ranking and scoring of measurement items.

Different issues of ecotourism were raised by different researchers throughout the world. Issues such as challenges to ecotourism, impacts of ecotourism focusing on environmental aspects, social aspects and economic aspects, visitors attitude towards ecotourism, role of local guide in ecotourism and ecotourism certification were raised by the researchers. Primary and secondary sources of information were analyzed by researchers through literature reviews, questionnaire survey, semi structured interviews, key informant interviews, participant observation, Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats' (SWOT) analysis and qualitative researches. This chapter identified location, objectives and methodologies imple‐ mented in the ecotourism researches. Methodologies implemented by different researchers were quiet similar but the objectives and study area were different.
