Conservation education in Kinabalu Park, Malaysia: analysis of visitors’ satisfaction
2014
Rosilawati Z. | Goh, H. C.
Tourism is an important component of protected areas. Nonetheless, it brings both positive and negative impacts. While tourism may potentially threaten nature conservation, it provides substantialeconomic income to support conservation efforts. Therefore, enhancing visitor awareness through education in the park is important. Today, most parks offer tourism activities with educational values. However, due to shortage of staff, it is not possible to obtain visitors’ feedback pertaining to their educational experience. This paper aims to reveal visitors’ satisfaction on their educational experience specifically the guiding quality in Kinabalu Park, Malaysia. Questionnaire survey was conducted in the park stratifying domestic and foreign visitors. While most visitors were satisfied with their experience and interaction with guides, there was still room for improvement in terms of capacity building among guides from the local communities. There was increasing expectation of foreign visitors and repeat visitors which were not captured by the park management. Differences in satisfaction level between domestic and foreign visitors were also studied.
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