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The development of ecotourism in protected areas faces the challenge of balancing conservation and ecotourism. Ecotourism suitability assessments are essential tools for managing tourism in these areas. However, current assessments often overlook biological factors, leading to adverse effects on wildlife. This study uses the Northeast China Tiger and Leopard National Park as a case study to establish a comprehensive assessment system that integrates ecotourism suitability with tiger and leopard habitat suitability, thereby linking ecotourism with wildlife conservation. The primary research methods include ecotourism suitability analysis based on the entropy weight method and habitat suitability analysis using the MaxEnt model. Based on the zoning results of ecotourism and habitat suitability, a comprehensive ecotourism suitability zoning map was produced. This map indicates that areas of very high suitability account for 45.62% of the total area, covering approximately 6152.563 km2, and are primarily located on the edges of village clusters. These areas can be prioritized for developing tourism infrastructure. The comprehensive ecotourism assessment system can balance the development of ecotourism with wildlife conservation, contributing significantly to the coordinated development of economic, social, and environmental objectives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aims at investigating the rural tourism development perceived by involved local farmers in China with a case study of Gaochun County. A total of 25 local famers were interviewed and 3 interviews were conducted on the employees from a major external tourism developing company. The text data transcribed from interviews were categorized and analyzed within the framework of the adaptive cycle. The findings indicate that becoming a Gaochun town is an external disturbance to the activation of system release and reorganization, and the subsequent support and tourism policies from the local government can be regarded as an improvement force that accelerates the system into the phase of exploitation and then into a new cycle. Secondly, rapid rural tourism development didn't last for a long time before confronting bottlenecks at the crossing of development. Local farmers prefer to stay in the conservation phase in the form of tourism cooperatives, while the government prefers to push the system into the phase of release and reorganization again by attracting external companies to invest on and manage the tourism development without involving local farmers. Both the advantages and disadvantages of those different approaches, as well as management implications, were discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]