Author details

social study by Ibrahim and Hassan [36] found Pahang National Park is among of popular ecotourism destinations in Malaysia where in 2008 approximately more than 40,000 international tourists arrived at this park. The local, domestic and ASEAN tourists were approximately more than 20,000 who visited Pahang National Park in the same year. Majority of stated tourists were staying at the provided hotel and chalet around of Kuala Tahan. This may suggest that camping areas were the lesser used by the visitors to do their activities within the forest area as their interest to enjoy the nature and get back to hotel or chalet for overnight. Therefore, trekking trail was recorded higher soil compaction than the camping area and natural area. The degree of soil compaction is totally depending on disturbance type and visit

Pahang National Park is visited by many local and international tourists, which through their activities would lead to the implications on forest conditions. Therefore, measurement of light intensity and soil compaction assessed in Pahang National Park will surely shed new insight on protected forest management in Malaysia. This study revealed that ecotourism activities have a significant influence on light intensity and soil compaction within three study sites. Based on the findings, there was significant difference between natural area and trekking trail. Study also found there is no significant difference on camping area vs. natural area and camping area vs. trekking trail for light intensity, while in the context of soil compaction, from the multiple comparison test, there was a significant difference between camping area and trekking trail and natural area and trekking trail. No significant difference found between camping area and natural area. Thus, trekking trail was found the most influenced by the ecotourism activities compared to the camping area. And the natural area was classified as the undisturbed condition and used as the control plots. It is clear that to fill the void in our knowledge, study should be done to learn more about the trend of ecotourism influence to the forest area of Pahang National Park. The number of sample for camping area needs to be increased, and relationship between the frequency of visitors and the influences on variables

We thank the Ministry of Higher Education (MoHE) for supporting this study through Fundamental Research Grant Scheme (FRGS). We would like to thank the Department of Wildlife and National Parks (PERHILITAN) for granting permission to use Pahang National Park for the study area. Special thanks go to Professor Dr. Yap Bee Wah, a statistician of Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM), for her support and explanation on the statistical parts, and finally

to my research assistants who aided during the field data collection.

frequency [37].

168 National Parks - Management and Conservation

4. Conclusion

should be looked thoroughly.

Acknowledgements

Mohamad Danial Md Sabri<sup>1</sup> \*, Mohd Nazip Suratman2,3, Abd Rahman Kassim1 , Nur Hajar Zamah Shari<sup>1</sup> , Shamsul Khamis<sup>4</sup> and Mohd Salleh Daim<sup>3</sup>

\*Address all correspondence to: danial@frim.gov.my

1 Forest Research Institute Malaysia, Selangor, Malaysia

2 Faculty of Applied Sciences, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Shah Alam, Selangor, Malaysia

3 Centre of Biodiversity and Sustainable Development, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Shah Alam, Selangor, Malaysia

4 School of Environmental & Natural Resource Sciences, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, Selangor, Malaysia
