Tourism Impact on Environmental Sustainability: A Focus on the Cruise Industry

The growth of the Global Economy and in particular the Caribbean Islands has been for the last two decades fueled by the cruise shipping industry. However, the growth in this industry gives rise to the expansion in ship size and the number of destinations. Unfortunately, the cruise line industry is responsible for the largest volume of waste, pollutants and destruction to marine lives when compared to other maritime industry sector. This chapter seeks to highlight the correlation between the industry and the growing global need for vibrant economies, a high quality of life, while protecting the environment and sustaining the world's natural resources. A review of several literature has shown that within the last twenty years, the cruise lines have invested a lot of time and money correcting the negative environmental impacts created. Several proactive and green shipping initiatives designed to improve environmental management were successfully implemented by the industry. These diverse initiatives are group as follows: Research and Innovation, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and Marketing, Awareness raising/environmental education initiative, and Green technologies. Emanating from these initiatives are: reduce or obviate of harmful environmental emissions and environmental management improvements and ultimately an environment that is experiencing an increased level of sustainability and economic activities.