Journal Article

Sustainability of Green Tourism among International Tourists and Its Influence on the Achievement of Green Environment: Evidence from North Cyprus

Ibnou-Laaroussi, Samah, Wong, Wing-Keung, Rjoub, Husam

2020

Overview

Sustainability of green tourism is gaining more attention from different stakeholders due to its environmental benefits. However, empirical studies on the behavioral aspect of the tourists towards sustainability of green tourism and its influence on the achievement of the green environment have not been exhaustively researched, most especially in a small island state like North Cyprus. In this paper, we investigate the behavioral aspects of international tourists towards the sustainability of green tourism employing an extended framework of the theory of planned behavior (TPB). A sample of 395 questionnaires was administered to the tourists that lodged at the 20 randomly selected five-star hotels in North Cyprus, while the study model was examined through structural equation modelling (SEM). Our study findings indicated that tourists’ perceptions of the sustainability of green tourism and their environmental concerns had a significantly positive impact on their attitudes. In addition, our results revealed that subjective norms had a significantly negative impact on intentions of the tourists to participate in sustainability of green tourism, while attitude was found to have a significantly positive impact on the tourists’ intentions to participate in the sustainability of green tourism. Moreover, we found that both environmental concerns and the intention of the tourists to participate in the sustainability of green tourism had a significantly positive impact on environmentally responsible tourism behavior. Lastly, our study contributes to enhancing the understanding of the perception of tourists on the green environment as it affects their behavior and subsequent influence on their intention to participate in the sustainability of green tourism with the attendant impact on the achievement of environmental degradation reduction.