Management of Resources-Based Tourism at Tikal National Park in Northern Guatemala

Introduction Resources-based tourism is often an economic necessity in natural resources-dependent communities. Tikal National Park, located in the Petén region of northern Guatemala (Figure 1), contains an ancient Mayan urban center and was declared a mixed cultural–natural World Heritage Site by the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in 1979 (National Geographic Book Service 1987). Since then, the number of visitors has been growing and the park has become an important tourist attraction in Guatemala (Matola and Platt 1998). Currently the Guatemalan government and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are making efforts to develop resources-based sustainable ecotourism in the Petén (Norris and Wilber 1998). This study investigates the economic contribution of Tikal to the economy of Guatemala and the Petén region, and examined visitors’ satisfaction level, attitudes toward conservation, and demographics to identify the future possibilities of ecotourism promotion in the region.