Construction of Tourism Infrastructure and the Environment

The quality of environment, both natural and man-made are essential to tourism. However, tourism's relationship with environment is very complex, and many activities can have an adverse effect on the environment. Many of the environmental impacts are linked with the construction of general infrastructure such as roads, airports, lodges, hotels, shops and golf courses. The negative impact of tourism development can gradually destroy the environmental resources on which it depends. Moreover, tourism can put enormous pressure on an area and lead to impacts such as:soil erosion, pollution, natural habitat loss and pressure on the endangered species and many more.

Since, the Himalayan region is mountainous, it has very few lands which are suitable for development of proper tourism infrastructure. Few lands which are used by the locals for cultivation are sometimes being taken  for the development of tourism infrastructure. In addition, increased tourism in the Himalayas has lead to rapid road and airport construction which involves clearing of great numbers of trees. Trees are vital to the soil integrity of the most hill top and mountain ranges. If there are no trees, there is a potential for landslides to occur frequently, and basically destroying the habitat of the wildlife.

Furthermore, tourism industry generally overuse water resources for hotels, swimming pools, golf courses and the personal use of water by the tourist. This can eventually result in water shortage as well as generating greater volume of waste water.Most of the time, locals are left without  resources because of the overuse of resources by the tourism industry.