DEVELOPMENT AND VALIDATION OF A SCALE TO MEASURE PERCEIVED SUSTAINABILITY OF TOURISM DESTINATIONS: A MULTI STAKEHOLDER APPROACH

The term sustainability emerges as a buzz word in all sectors of development. Achieving sustainability in triple-bottom line areas viz; society, environment, and economy become a point of concern for policy makers and planners, considering the brewing imbalance prevailing in the current approach of development. Being a fastest growing industry, the issue gets much attention in the tourism sector. Though it has a decisive role in regional development and economic growth, the issue of overreaching of carrying capacity and the adverse impacts of tourism on the lives of local residents and environment raise questions on the future of tourism. Hence also, special attention should be put to maintain sustainability of tourism destinations. It was in the wake of these situation, present study endeavored in to development of a stake holder based scale to measure sustainability of tourism destinations.