Communities’ Perceptions towards Ecotourism Competitiveness- Sama Jaya Nature Reserve, Malaysia

The term “ecotourism” can be defined as responsible travel to natural areas that conserves the environment and improves the well-being of local people (The International Ecotourism Society, 1990). The aim of this study is to explore the factors influencing communities' perceptions in ecotourism competitiveness. The factors to be discussed include community knowledge, community support, economic impacts, environmental impacts, social-cultural impacts and stakeholder's involvement. 113 respondents comprising of local communities from Sama Jaya Nature Reserve took part voluntarily in this research. Partial least square structural equation modelling is applied by using SmartPLS 3.0 to analyse the collected data on path modelling and bootstrapping. Interestingly, all of these factors demonstrate significant influence on ecotourism competitiveness except social-cultural factor. It is postulated that these findings are of beneficial to the tourism implementers and decision makers in developing the right tourism development paradigms in the area. Findings implication and future research directions are also discussed.