Elephant camps and their impacts to community: Case study in Keud Chang, Chiang Mai Province, Thailand

Abstract

The objectives of this research were to describe the existing elephant camps in Thailand for developing tourism destination, and to analyze their impact for communty based tourism. The data were gathered in Keud Chang Subdistrict, Maeteng District, Chiang Mai Province, Thailand. Chiang Mai is very famous for tourist attractions especially for natural and communty based tourism, while in Maetang especially in Keud Chang a lot of elephants became the main attraction of tourism. The results showed that there were impact of the developing Elephant Camps both in negative and positive. The negative impacts were more in destruction of the forest area due to over of carrying capacity, natureless for the elephant life, and miss-usage for forest area since the land use not plan well by local community. While in positive impacts were growing faster for local economic and cultural excange more dynamic between local communities and visitors. This study concluded that elephant camp proves to be one agent of socio-economic change, contribute to change in the community of Keud Chang. Environmental degradation and government policy are interconnected with tourism. Environmental degradation and government policy have made it more difficult for the villagers of Keud Chang to make a living in the traditional way. As a result of the development of tourism the villagers of Keud Chang have become more firmly integrated into the national market economy. Consequently, they are also becoming more integrated into the Thai nation state.