Environmental management practices among coastal beach hotels in Kenya

Abstract

Environmental management is today becoming an essential aspect of the operations of tourism businesses globally to the point that a number of environmental initiatives have been put in place by tourism developers. “Green” accommodation images have become a powerful operational tool in attracting and retaining more guests and in achieving cost reduction measures. However, there seems to be a gap in monitoring outcomes of such initiatives. The objective of this study was to identify environmental management practices adopted by beach hotels on the Kenyan coast and establish factors that limited adoption of environmental management practices. Data was gathered through questionnaire surveys distributed to a stratified sample of 32 star-rated beach hotels. Frequencies, percentages and chi-square analyses revealed that the general level of adoption and implementation of environmental management practices was below average and that there was no significant relationship between hotel star category and extent of adoption of environmental management practices. Environmental management practices related to energy conservation and water conservation were adopted by the majority of the hotels in the study. This was possibly driven by profit motives. The principle of “reduce, reuse and recycle” was yet to be fully adopted by the hotels. In future, enhanced capacity building, all stakeholders’ collective involvement and closer monitoring by relevant environmental agencies are recommended as the most appropriate approaches towards achieving environmental sustainability through hotel development in this tourist destination.