Despite the fact that the Wild Coast area is well endowed with natural resources, the area is severely underdeveloped and experiencing high levels of unemployment. It is against this background that the South African government has chosen tourism as an appropriate development instrument for Port St. Johns. The empirical evidence shows that coastal tourism development has produced benefits such as employment and income generation in countries like Kenya, which share the same development trends with the Eastern Cape. Thus, the Wild Coast Spatial Development Initiative (WCSDI) has been proposed as a vehicle to promote tourism development. The WCSDI aims at unlocking the inherent and under-utilised economic potential of certain specific spatial locations, like Port St. Johns. In this study a critical analysis of the tourism-related projects proposed for Port St. Johns is undertaken, making use of cost-benefit analysis techniques and drawing on projections made in the course of the WCSDI planning process. The study shows that these projects can lead to economic growth through attracting investment and creating employment opportunities. However, this study does not show the exact number of jobs created by this development, as most of these projects are still in the planning stage. Lessons should be drawn from the Kenyan Coastal Development Corridor case study, in order to ensure that the WCSDI is a success. / Thesis (M.Com.)-University of Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 1999.

Contemporary globalisation in developing countries is circumscribed by neo-liberal development approaches, while community-based development seeks to create alternative development strategies. This thesis brings together research in tourism with theoretical perspectives from Gramscian social analysis in order to explore contemporary conflict between these two strategies in the tourism sector. The purpose is to investigate the influence the hegemonic global milieu has exerted on an alternative community-based tourism (CBT) strategy that was initially formally/institutionally supported. Concepts of hegemony, globalisation and divergence/convergence, together with development theories, are explored and applied to the international tourism sector and CBT in particular. A theoretical structure is proposed in which the relationships between hegemony, globalisation, and processes of divergence/convergence are explicated in relation to the tourism sector, and CBT in particular. Global-local linkages, conceptualised in terms of the theoretical framework, are explored in a particular geographical context, namely the Pondoland coast of South Africa. South Africa has recently rejoined the global socio-economic milieu after the isolation of the apartheid period and a European Union-supported tourism project in the Pondoland region is studied in detail. The case study serves to empirically substantiate the proposed theoretical framework. The investigation contributes to ‘initiate’ a global – local oriented paradigm in tourism study that focuses on the relationship between globalisation processes and a CBT development approach by exploiting and conjoining the correlation of the concepts of the proposed theoretical framework. Globalisation processes are set against a specific and local form of tourism, i.e. community-based tourism. The proposition is a ‘new’ double level of interlinkage. General and global policies are interlinked and cross each other with specific and local policies to evaluate a CBT project outcome. The study intends to go beyond existing literature of CBT management and project development. This is achieved by providing an investigation on the ‘unseen’ working mechanisms and influence of globalisation processes in relation to a specific CBT local project supported by a global actor in international cooperation, thus verifying interpretations and commitment on CBT development approaches. The case study findings elucidate and highlight the final effects of the theoretical proposition at a practical level by clarifying and showing the level of influence on, and re-adjustment of, the case study end result in comparison with its initial plan. A shift in the case study project development is individuated and commented on in relation to the proposed theoretical framework. The investigation results allow validating the proposed conceptual basis of the study. Based on the findings, this thesis a proposal is made to construct the interrelationship between development and CBT understanding. A typology and specific nomenclature of CBT approaches is advanced together with their correlation to development concepts. The conclusion also gives further general and specific recommendations by providing possible strategies to permit proper development and better exploitation of CBT possibilities. / Thesis (Ph.D.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2010.

Most rural communities, such as Nsikeni area under the Mabandla Tribal Authority (MTA) in the Eastern Cape (former Transkei), are located in apartheid-created 'homelands'. These rural areas have large human populations that depend on natural resources, but, they do not derive full benefits from natural resource use. This research study examines the socio-economic status and the Nsikeni community people's perceptions on developing the potential for fly fishing under the concept of community-based resource management (CBRM) strategies. The research attempts to assess the Nsikeni community's resource assets in the form of rivers and related infrastructure together with their human resource and to obtain knowledge and perceptions of available potential in relation to fly fishing. Attention is drawn to socio-economic needs which could challenge the sustainability of a community-based project, land use activities and associated impacts for the Ngwagwane River catchment area, and lastly, based on the Nsikeni community's opinion, a proposed model for a community-based strategy. / Thesis (M.Sc.)-University of Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2000.

Tourism is widely perceived as an easy access, low-impact means to achieving economic growth and development. In South Africa, community-based tourism has been promoted as a way of delivering resources and services to historically marginalised areas, and as a means by which rural communities can begin to exercise more control over the decisions and resources that directly affect the quality of their lives. A history of deliberate underdevelopment during apartheid, has left the Wild Coast region with high unemployment, widespread socio-economic poverty, limited infrastructure; and a pristine coastline of 'untapped' tourism potential. Given its incompatibility to other forms of development, tourism has been identified by government as a key sector for driving economic development and poverty alleviation along the Wild Coast. This study reviews four tourism enterprises in operation along the Pondoland Wild Coast in terms of their 'pro-poor' credentials (net benefits to local communities), socio-economic impact, participation and ownership by local communities, institutional establishment, and environmental sustainability. The selected operations exemplify different models of community and private sector involvement in tourism development on communal land. A wide range of investigative methodologies from primary and secondary data analysis, interviews, structured questionnaires, surveys, and quantitative assessment criteria, were employed in this study. The key findings and recommendations from the case studies are then considered in light of the developmental opportunities and constraints pertaining to the region. This study revealed that the Pondoland Wild Coast is faced with numerous socio-economic and environmental challenges. The principal limitations to sustainable tourism development include lack of basic infrastructure and services, prevailing tenure insecurity, unclear legislation and overlapping jurisdictional mandates, direct environmental threats such as a proposed toll road and mining, haphazard/illegal developments, and a poorly defined spatial planning framework. Whilst all four tourism enterprises appeared to be underpinned by sustainable development principles, they differed widely in the nature and size of benefits they provided, and their degree of institutional, economic and environmental sustainability. The findings and conclusions drawn from this study are intended to contribute towards the theory, practice and sustainability of 'pro-poor,' 'community-based', and 'responsible' tourism development, and assist future tourism development planning in the region. / Thesis(M.Sc.)-University of Kwazulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2004.

Thesis (M. Ed. (Education))--Rhodes University, 2006. / Half-thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Masters of Education (Environmental Education).