การประเมินศักยภาพแหล่งท่องเที่ยวทางธรรมชาติในพื้นที่ป่าชายเลน

Abstract

In order to enhance capacity of mangrove resources management for providing a potential ecotourism site, mangrove conservation and ecotourism resources development should be essentially considered to find a proper guideline of ecotourism management in mangrove forest areas. Therefore, the researchers aimed to evaluate a potential of ecotourism sites which located around mangrove forest area of Khok Kham Sub-District, Muang District in Samut Sakhon Province. Data were collected by using three tools. Questionnaire was designed and used for tourist data collection. Semi-Structured interview was applied for key informant interviews. A guide form of standard potential ecotourism sites evaluation, which was created by Department of Tourism of Thailand, was used for examining ecotourism sites in and around the mangrove area of a learning and practicing center for environment and natural resource rehabilitation and conservation at Eastern Mahachai, Samut Sakhon Province. Results of this study indicate that the areas of mangrove forest of the learning and practicing center for environment and natural resource rehabilitation and conservation are potentially enough to enhance its capacity of ecotourism site development since the evaluation analysis shows a positive level of good standard. Mangrove resources were appropriately managed. Land uses and activities were properly manipulated. Natural resource interpretation for knowledge dissemination and tourist awareness was created and practiced in the area. Moreover, local community had jointly participated in conservation, and had attempted to rehabilitate mangrove resources. Besides, it was found that tourists had positively appreciated the diversity of mangrove resources at a much level (𝑥𝑥 = 3.96, S.D. = 0.71). They also had satisfied a high level of natural tourism site security (𝑥𝑥 = 3.96, S.D. = 0.88). The diversity of natural resources and its security are essentially to enhance a higher potential level of ecotourism sites.