Econometric Analysis of Tourism and Environment Relationship in The Turkish Economy During 1990-2016

Abstract

The tourism sector influences the Turkish economy both directly and indirectly. However, the progress in the tourism sector in Turkey influences the environment negatively. In this study, different from the literature, ecologic footprint variant is used representing the environmental degradation in order to analyze the effects of tourism demand on the environment. The aim of the study is to analyze the effects of ecologic footprint on the Turkish economy with FMOLS and DOLS methods. The effects of tourism on environment are assessed with the data between the years 1990-2016. Empirical findings show that the progress in the tourism sector in Turkey increased the CO2 emissions leading to environmental degradation. This environmental degradation negatively influences the sustainable economic progress. Thus, it is stated that the tourism sector must progress taking into account the problem of carbon footprint. In this way, providing foreign currency inflow to the economy, both the economic dependency on external resources can be reduced and environmental problems can be eliminated.