Over-Tourism: A Potential Threat to Gilgit Baltistan’s Environment, Social and Cultural Heritage

Abstract

For the last few years, tourism has witnessed a rapid increase globally. The term over tourism comes to prominence as one of the highly discussed problems regarding tourism by mainstream media and different environmental organizations. The main objective of the article is to discuss the negative impacts of over-tourism on the environment as well as on the socio-cultural heritage of the regions of Gilgit Baltistan. The emergence of mass tourism in a single season affects many aspects of this region ranging from basic commodities to the social and cultural life of the locals.. Unregulated land development leads to deforestation, biodiversity loss, and soil erosion as infrastructure is built to accommodate the tourist flow. Methodology used for this research is based on the survey questionnair where respondent was given question in close ended form. Secondly desktop method is used where previous research were taken as supportive literature to give effectiveness of the primary data .The research finding highlights the negative impact of the over tourism on the environment as well as on the social-cultural structure of the locals of the Gilgit Baltistan. To overcome this issue government must focus on ecotourism and local people participation in policy making can reduce the negative impact of tourism in the region.