Rethinking Sustainable Tourism Management: Learning from the COVID-19 Pandemic to Co-Create Future of Krabi Tourism, Thailand

Abstract

Despite negative consequences from the COVID-19 pandemic, there are certain positive effects from this crisis including the restoration of natural resources. Using the institutional theory framework, this paper aims to explore how sustainable tourism management can be applied to manage recovered natural resources after the COVID-19 crisis. Qualitative research in the form of in-depth interviews, focus group interviews, and observations was conducted to demonstrate how Krabi tourism stakeholders could collaborate among themselves in order to sustain recovered natural resources after the COVID-19 pandemic. Informants of the study are Krabi tourism stakeholders; i.e., tourism business owners and managers, members of tourism associations, government officers, CBT members, that are recruited by purposive sampling method. This research has shed light on how tourism stakeholders can co-create tourism policies to respond to sustainability issues using the institutional process. In order to develop a successful sustainable tourism management plan, we propose that the plan should consist of three aspects—environmental, social, and economic. The findings from this research offer benefits to tourism stakeholders around the world for reshaping sustainable tourism management in order to take care of magnificent tourism resources after the COVID-19 outbreak.

1. Introduction

Tourism industry around the world has often faced many crises since 2000s; for example, SARs, economic recessions, terrorism, natural disasters, and most recently the coronavirus pandemic (hereafter; COVID-19). Each crisis causes dramatic damage to the economy, society, environment, and lives. Recently, the COVID-19 pandemic has spread to more than 200 countries around the world with more than 180 million infections and 4 million deaths (Worldometers, 2021, https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus, accessed on 10 July 2021). The tourism industry is one of many sectors heavily affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. Tourism revenues around the world declined by more than US$ 4 trillion in 2020 and 2021, and the unemployment rate increased by 5.5–15% [1]. The impact of COVID-19 on the tourism industry has caused a chain reaction to other sectors (e.g., transportation, manufacturing, food and beverage) because tourism plays an important role in securing economic stability of all nations. Thailand is one of the countries whose economy relies on tourism revenue (about 18.21% of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in 2019) [2]. The higher percentage of tourism revenue toward the GDP, the higher risk that the country’s economy will be affected by the crisis. In 2020, many tourism businesses in Thailand were closed due to the ‘Shut Down’ Act; all international flights were postponed or severely restricted in order to limit the transfer of the virus. While COVID-19 has negative impacts on the tourism industry, it creates positive effects on the environment such as improved air quality in cities across the world (due to reduction in traffic and shutdown of heavy industries), coral reef restoration, increased fish density and wildlife activities (due to a decline in human activity). However, the strategy to manage national resources after the COVID-19 is still unfolding.

Many scholars (e.g., Pongsakornrungsilp et al. (2021) [3], Rogerson (2021) [4], Duarte Alonso et al. (2020) [5]) have demonstrated solutions to tackle the COVID-19 pandemic in order to mitigate its impacts in the short-term and long-term. Resilience-based framework has been employed to manage COVID-19 impacts by including different stakeholders (i.e., government units, local communities, tourists, and tourism businesses) to deal with the recovery actions [5,6]. Abbas et al. (2021) [7] use the concept of transformation and organization change to sustainably recover travel and leisure industry. Sustainability is one of research focuses through COVID-19 recovery management. However, most of them tend to look at tourism business recovery in terms of business survival and financial situation, even though sustainable tourism management is one of the areas that should be considered when managing through the crisis. Recent research (e.g., Tan et al. (2018) [8], Zhang et al. (2020) [9], Pardo (2020) [10], Sivapalan et al. (2021) [11]) has focused on sustainable tourism management in different cities by studying green consumer behavior, consumption, and environment. To date, there is limited research that explores how sustainable tourism management can be applied to manage impacts from COVID-19. A crucial issue is how tourism stakeholders can sustain natural resources that have recovered during the crisis.

Sustainable development goals (SDGs) are a strategy to tackle poverty and environmental issues that are recently recognized by organizations in many countries as important goals because SDGs can provide sustainable future for the planet, especially SDGs Goal 11 and 12 [12]. The tourism industry is one of the important sectors to focus on SDGs by employing sustainability management to balance the impacts toward society, economy, and environment [13]. After the COVID-19 pandemic, natural resources have recovered because all activities and consumption related to tourism industry were automatically mitigated due to ‘Shut Down’ Act. In Thailand, during April 2020, all tourism businesses and flights came to a halt, and there were only a few tourists visiting the destinations [3]. As seen from many works in sustainable tourism management mentioned above [8,9,10,11], tourism scholars tend to apply different concepts to deal with sustainable issues in tourism, but they have overlooked how sustainable tourism management can be employed to handle natural resource management after the COVID-19 outbreak.

Krabi is one of the popular destinations with magnificent nature and beach in Thailand (see also Figure 1). In 2019, 6.75 million tourists visited Krabi, and 63.80% were international tourists [14]. Krabi province has co-created the Krabi Declaration 2013 through collaboration with all tourism stakeholders, including the government, businesses, local community, the Tourism Authority of Thailand, Krabi Office, Krabi Hotel Association, and Krabi Tourism Council, by placing emphasis on being a ‘Green Destination’ and emphasizing sustainable tourism management [15]. On the one hand, the number of tourists arriving in Krabi has dramatically declined since 2019 due to the pandemic. On the other hand, it provides recovery time for natural resources to rehabilitate after being exploited by the tourism industry. With a strong network within Krabi tourism stakeholders [16], the Think Tank—a group of experienced tourism stakeholders—plays an important role in driving collaboration among Krabi tourism stakeholders to enforce sustainable management. Like Timur and Getz (2008) [17], tourism stakeholders are key factors in co-creating a sustainable tourism policy; therefore, different stakeholders should be included in the management process. However, there is a little interest in focusing on the institutional process of sustainable development and management even though tourism stakeholders and tourism associations are resource integrators [18] whereby new knowledge and resources can be co-created through a collaboration network. Therefore, in response to Tan et al. (2018) [8], Zhang et al. (2020) [9], Pardo (2020) [10], Sivapalan et al. (2021) [11], this study aims to address this gap by exploring how sustainable tourism can be employed to manage recovered natural resources after the COVID-19 pandemic through the institutional process.

To set up sustainable development for the post-pandemic time (i.e., the new normal), sustainable tourism and institutional theory have been employed by integrating Krabi tourism stakeholders into the study. As mentioned by Pongsakornrungsilp and Pongsakornrungsilp (2021) [16], Krabi tourism stakeholders have a strong collaborative network that contains the institutional process for driving sustainability. Qualitative research in the form of focus group interviews was conducted to demonstrate how Krabi tourism stakeholders could collaborate among themselves in order to sustain natural resources after the COVID-19 pandemic. Therefore, the findings of this paper will offer benefits to tourism stakeholders in different destinations for reshaping sustainable tourism management in order to take care of magnificent tourism resources after the COVID-19 outbreak.

The rest of the paper is structured as follows. The next section discusses current research in sustainable tourism and institutional theory. Section 3 demonstrates the methodology, data collection, and analysis. Qualitative inquiry is discussed in this section to demonstrate how focus group interviews were employed. Section 4 presents the findings, and Section 5 provides discussion and conclusion, including recommendations for tourism management stakeholders and future research.

2. Literature Review

Section 2.1 discusses how sustainable tourism can be adopted to manage the natural resources, which have recovered during the COVID-19 outbreak, after the shutdown. Section 2.2 demonstrates how tourism stakeholders play an important role as resource integrators and how the institutional process can drive sustainability.

2.1. Sustainable Tourism

Sustainable tourism has long been employed by both practitioners and academics since 1980s to reduce tourism impacts toward social, economic, and environmental areas [19,20]. Its foundational concept is about how stakeholders can manage natural resource consumption by conserving the resources for next generation [21].

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has brought challenges to sustainability management in times of uncertainty. Sustainability is adopted by all tourism stakeholders to manage sustainable tourism. For example, Yiu and Cheung (2021) [22] have used a zoning plan to recover destination areas after the COVID-19 pandemic. Compared with tourism management in the past, tourism researchers and policymakers were relatively slow to respond to sustainable development and have remained somewhat detached from the continuing debate on the interpretation and implications of sustainability [23]. This perhaps reflects an introspective tendency of many tourism academics [24,25]. Addressing the key dimensions of sustainable development; environmental, economic and social impact in the tourism sector is driven by an accelerating climate change concern and it has been an increasing priority recently.

Many works reveal the impact of tourism on natural resources, social community, and economic structure [26]. Tourism scholars have long been struggling to apply sustainable tourism in practice including management approaches and tools designed to better integrate tourism development as well as the protection of the natural resources in tourist destination areas [16]. Recently, sustainable tourism has been frequently explained simply in terms of finding an appropriate balance among the needs of tourists and locals, the environment, and tourism business related to economic development. Zhang et al. (2020) [9] conducted a study on the economic aspect of sustainable tourism in terms of tourists’ consumption intention and cultural identity. Tourists are important components of sustainable tourism that need to be informed about sustainable natural resources and how they can participate in sustainable activities during their leisure time [27]. However, tourism stakeholders are also key components to drive sustainability because they have to manage facilities and activities to serve the tourists [10]. Therefore, they should be aware of the benefits of sustainable tourism. Pongsakornrungsilp and Pongsakornrungsilp (2021) [16] have employed the concept of mindful consumption (see also [28]) and applied to tourism management. They demonstrate that mindful mindset should be emphasized among all stakeholders in order to drive sustainable behavior.

Co-creating sustainability is meant to halt the utilization of natural resources, reduce pollution, and mitigate climate-related risks. Sustainable tourism tends to focus on how tourism stakeholders can sustain natural resources and reduce negative impacts of the tourism industry [8,9,10,11]. In fact, COVID-19 has offered an opportunity to reset and reshape the world in a more sustainable way. Challenges in all sectors to turn activities to online platforms and remote working models can lead us to rethink the elements we consider essential for productive tourism in the post-COVID-19 era. While COVID-19 has negative effects on the tourism industry in terms of economy, it provides plenty of opportunities for natural resource restoration. The important question is not how we can recover natural resources, but instead, it is how we can sustain the recovered natural resources in the long run.

2.2. Institutional Theory

Institutional theory has been employed to create a congruent goal among stakeholders for developing sustainable management policy [20]. To understand the concept of institution theory, institutions are defined as “the rules of the game or humanly-devised structures that provide incentives and constraints to economic actors” (North, 1990: 3) [29]. It is discussed in terms of norms, rules, cultures, policies and practices that different participants co-create through social interactions [30]. Many scholars (e.g., Falaster, Zanin and Guerrazzi (2017) [31], Font et al. (2019) [32], Peters et al. (2019) [33], Pongsakornrungsilp and Pongsakornrungsilp (2021) [16]) have employed the institutional theory to tourism research by providing an additional lens to understand practices or actions from different tourism stakeholders (e.g., tourism business, tourism association, tourists, and staff members). It is a collective process to drive norms and rules within the tourism fields (e.g., cities, destinations, and tourism associations) [32]. As mentioned by Zenker et al. (2017) [34], the development of policies in the tourism industry is related to different stakeholders from different sectors in the industry (e.g., hotel and accommodation, transportation, food, and tourism activities). This could cause conflicts among the stakeholders. Through the concept of institutional theory, the integration of all tourism stakeholders plays an important role in developing an effective sustainable tourism policy [20]. To understand how tourism stakeholders can co-create strong policies to tackle environmental issues, resource integration and institutional process should be discussed.

Koskela–Huotari and Vargo (2016) [18] have integrated the resource-based theory and institutional theory to develop the resource co-creation framework because, in developing norms through the institutional theory, all parties require resources to interact with others. To co-create resources (e.g., knowledge, information, insights, norms, and rules), an organization is required. Vargo and Lusch (2008) [35] proposed that the organization plays an important role as a ‘resource integrator’–a platform where members within the organization can co-create ‘resources’ through an interaction, participation, and discussion process. This kind of community can be a group of consumers within an online community [36] or employees within a formal organization [37]. de Grosbois (2015) [37] employed the institutional process as a context of the study in developing corporate social responsibility (CSR) by focusing on an organization being an open platform where the organization environment influences its members to co-create beliefs, cultures, and goals of the organization. However, this paper does not emphasize institutional process as a context, but instead, it is a main concept to demonstrate how tourism stakeholders can co-create sustainable management policies to respond to post-COVID-19 challenges. As mentioned by Pongsakornrungsilp and Schroeder (2011) [36], all parties within an online community are resource integrators at the individual level and the community, itself, is also a resource integrator by including all individual parties to collaborate in co-creating new resources–rules, regulations, and guidelines. It is an integration process among individuals and also a collective level of interaction whereby resource integration is a central part of resource co-creation [38,39,40]. Vargo and Lusch (2011) [40] demonstrate that individuals cannot co-create resources by themselves, but they need to interact with others. However, Pongsakornrungsilp and Schroeder (2017) [41] show that an individual can be a resource integrator by co-creating value for themselves in terms of emotion, personal knowledge, and experience. Additionally, resource integration requires the value co-creation process, where each party employs their own resources (i.e., knowledge, experience, and competence) to co-create benefits for other parties [30]. Through this concept, all parties can be resource integrators. Therefore, within an organization or a community, how participants can collaborate to co-create ‘resources,’ is necessary to be considered. By doing this, at the individual level, an individual tends to focus on their own benefits and each individual needs an open mind to employ their own resources to co-create, interact, and synthesize with other organization members [18,42,43].

Within an organization or a community, all members can be resource integrators through rules and regulations of service ecosystem [40]. The service ecosystem is an organization or community where members can co-create value or resources with other parties. However, Koskela–Huotari and Vargo (2016) [18] strongly believe that the service ecosystem or organization is not a unidimensional context, but instead, it is a multidimensional context where different stakeholders play an important role in co-creating value independently. To support the resource co-creation theory, an institutional process through the interaction among members is required to develop rules or principles of membership. It is what members in the organization or resource integrator hold as being a guideline or way to co-create values or resources [18,38,44]. The guidelines within the resource integrators are framed by an institutional arrangement, which influences the culture, codes of conduct, and the structure of the organization [45]. Therefore, it is interesting to explore how resources are co-created through an institutional process within the complexity of resource integration.

From this perspective, a tourism association is an organization that plays an active role as a resource integrator, which includes different individual resource integrators from different tourism stakeholders (e.g., hotel businesses, local community, transportation, tourism activities, food, and travel businesses). Each stakeholder is also a resource integrator that contains their own norms or rules. Lavandoski et al. (2016) [46] recommend applying the institutional theory in sustainable tourism by demonstrating that the institutional theory in the environment context is the largest area of the study whereby concerns about the environment have put pressure on tourism stakeholders to focus on environment management. Scott’s (1995) [47] three elements of the institutions (regulative, normative, and cognitive) are main concepts in most tourism studies. The regulative element is a formal guideline or rules of resource integrator or organization [46], while the normative element is informal values and social norms for organization members that play a role as a source of legitimacy with other organizations [31]. The latter, the cognitive element, is the cultural meaning within the organization whereby individuals are influenced by institutional arrangement [18]. Within a tourism context, Falaster et al. (2017) [31] have employed the institutional theory to develop a destination image. As one of high institutional complexity from multi-independent organizations, the tourism industry requires specific tactics to respond to the complexity [31,48]. Pongsakornrungsilp and Pongsakornrungsilp (2021) [16] studied the institutional complexity of Krabi tourism stakeholders by synthesizing the macro, meso, and micro levels of analysis to drive circular economy in order to gain legitimacy from all stakeholders. They demonstrated how different resource integrators (e.g., Krabi Think Tank, Krabi province, tourism associations, government offices, tourism businesses, and tourism community) can collaborate in co-creating resources or a green culture to drive Krabi province to achieve the Green Tourism vision. However, how one destination can co-create tourism policies to respond to sustainable issues using the institutional process still needs to be unfolded. This leads to our first proposition:

Proposition 1: 

Tourism stakeholders can develop strategies to manage sustainable tourism through the institutional process.

Peters et al. (2019) [33] also employed the institution theory with sustainable tourism by looking at the meso level-tourism association, which includes different tourism stakeholders to tackle sustainability issues. As mentioned by Koskela–Huotari and Vargo (2016) [18], resource integrators work in line with institutional actors [33,49] by allowing stakeholders to engage in resource creation. However, Peters et al.’s (2019) [33] institution theory is employed to develop sustainable tourism monitoring systems rather than to focus on developing policies. Additionally, they focus on an informal organization, which is a voluntary association which includes different parties within the industry. To understand the institutional theory in formal organizations, Font et al. (2019) [32] study travel associations toward corporate social responsibility (CSR). They also call for further research on how tourism stakeholders can respond to sustainability changes. This leads to our second proposition:

Proposition 2:

Tourism associations can employ the institution theory to co-create sustainable tourism policies to manage natural resources after the COVID-19 outbreak.

3. Methodology

3.1. Research Design

A qualitative method was employed to collect data on how sustainable tourism can be adapted to manage natural resources after the COVID-19 outbreak. In-depth and focus group interviews were the main inquiry methods to collect data with Krabi tourism stakeholders to understand the institutional process. Peters et al. (2019) [33] recommended that a qualitative method can contribute to the richness of data and provide economic benefits with low costs of travelling and incentives (see also [50]). A qualitative inquiry was useful to study the institutional process with tourism stakeholders [33,51]. Additionally, participated and non-participated observations were employed to triangulate data methodologically with tourism stakeholders. The first author participated in the tourism activities, events, and also the meeting with Krabi tourism stakeholders, informally, in order to conduct participated and non-participated observation. However, informants were informed about data collection and observation process. Pongsakornrungsilp et al. (2021) [3] recommended that these qualitative inquiries can provide multiple perspectives from tourism stakeholders.

A total of 109 informants who were tourism stakeholders including hotel business owners, restaurant owners, tourism business managers, members of community-based tourism (hereafter; CBT) participated in in-depth and focus group interviews from January to June 2021. During the data collection process, the first author participated in two meetings with the Krabi Tourism and Sports Office, the provincial government authority on tourism. These meetings provided a perspective from the government office on tourism management. Five individual stakeholders were interviewed for 30 min about tourism policy and perspective toward sustainable tourism, and the post-COVID-19. These informants; i.e., the Chief of Krabi Tourism and Sport Office, two hotel owners, a restaurant owner, and a CBT member; were recruited through purposive sampling method. These informants were also invited to share and discuss in focus group interviews with other stakeholders. Each focus group consisted of 10–15 informants lasted approximately 3 h. Informants were tourism business owners and managers, members of tourism associations, government officers, CBT members. These informants were recruited by purposive sampling method from stakeholders who were operating tourism activities. Before the focus group interview, the informants were informed about research ethics and asked to sign a consent form. They were asked to share information and insights about natural resource management after the pandemic through the following questions:

(1)

What is the status of natural resources after the COVID-19 pandemic?

(2)

How can tourism stakeholders adopt the concept of sustainable tourism to manage the natural resources after the COVID-19 pandemic?

(3)

What are proactive methods to reduce risks from future crises?

During the data collection, interviews were recorded using sound recorders and field notes were taken. The data were initially inscribed by the researcher during the data collection process. To ensure the validity and reliability of the study, data triangulation was conducted through several data sources, and methodological triangulation was performed through different data collection methods as recommended by Pongsakornrungsilp et al. (2021) [52]. These processes contributed to an understanding of all tourism stakeholders’ perspectives–tourism businesses, local communities, and government officers.

3.2. Data Analysis

After transcribing the field notes, the data were analyzed through a thematic analysis whereby the iterative process was completed [53]. Firstly, transcripts were read, and assigned codes and definitions before being reread many times in order to reduce replication and unclear codes. Secondly, through an iterative process, the data and theory were revised until there was no duplicate code in the dataset. Thirdly, codes were read and grouped into different themes, and the definitions of each theme were defined. Themes and meanings were employed in the iterative process to reduce duplicate themes as recommended by Thompson (1997) [54]. All codes were reread and considered by three experts in tourism management–an academic researcher, a tourism business owner, and a member of the tourism association.

Table 1. Informants’ characteristics.

Participants	Gender	Type of Business	Job Role	Participants	Gender	Type of Business	Job Role
A	Male	Hotel	Owner	D2	Male	Local Authority	Leader
B	Male	Hotel	Owner	E2	Male	Local Authority	Leader
C	Female	Hotel	Owner	F2	Male	Local Authority	Leader
D	Male	Hotel	Owner	G2	Male	Business	Owner
E	Male	Hotel	Owner	H2	Female	Business	Staff
F	Female	Hotel	Owner	I2	Female	CBT	CBT member
G	Female	Hotel	Owner	J2	Female	CBT	CBT member
H	Male	Hotel	Owner	K2	Female	CBT	CBT member
I	Male	Hotel	Owner/Tourism Organization Representative	L2	Male	CBT	CBT member
J	Female	Government	Government Officer	M2	Female	CBT	CBT member
K	Female	Hotel	Owner	N2	Female	CBT	CBT member
L	Male	Restaurant	Owner/Tourism Organization Representative	O2	Female	CBT	CBT member
M	Female	CBT	CBT member	P2	Female	Government	Government Officer
N	Male	Hotel	Management	Q2	Female	Business	Staff
O	Male	Hotel	Owner/Tourism Organization	R2	Male	Business	Staff
P	Male	CBT	CBT member	S2	Male	CBT	CBT member
Q	Male	CBT	CBT member	T2	Male	Government	Government Officer
R	Male	CBT	CBT member	U2	Female	Government	Government Officer
S	Male	CBT	CBT member	V2	Male	Government	Government Officer
T	Female	CBT	CBT member	W2	Male	Government	Government Officer
U	Male	CBT	CBT member	X2	Male	Local Authority	Leader
V	Male	Retired	Former Government Officer	Y2	Male	Tourism Business	Owner
W	Female	Hotel	Owner/Tourism Organization Representative	Z2	Male	Tourism Business	Tourism Organization Representative
X	Female	CBT	CBT member	A3	Male	Government	Government Officer
Y	Female	CBT	CBT member	B3	Male	Government	Government Officer
Z	Female	CBT	CBT member	C3	Male	Government	Government Officer
A1	Male	CBT	CBT member	D3	Male	Government	Government Officer
B1	Female	CBT	CBT member	E3	Female	Government	Government Officer
C1	Female	CBT	CBT member	F3	Male	Government	Government Officer
D1	Male	Government	Government Officer	G3	Male	Government	Government Officer
E1	Male	CBT	CBT member	H3	Female	Government	Government Officer
F1	Male	CBT	CBT member	I3	Male	Government	Government Officer
G1	Male	CBT	CBT member	J3	Male	Tourism Business	Owner
H1	Male	CBT	CBT member	K3	Male	Government	Government Officer
I1	Female	CBT	CBT member	L3	Female	CBT	CBT member
J1	Female	Business	Owner	M3	Female	CBT	CBT member
K1	Male	Business	Owner	N3	Female	CBT	CBT member
L1	Male	Business	Owner	O3	Female	CBT	CBT member
M1	Male	Hotel	Owner/Tourism Organization Representative	P3	Female	CBT	CBT member
N1	Male	Hotel	Owner/Tourism Organization Representative	Q3	Male	CBT	CBT member
O1	Female	Government	Government Officer	R3	Male	CBT	CBT member
P1	Male	Hotel	Owner/Tourism Organization Representative	S3	Female	CBT	CBT member
Q1	Male	Hotel	Owner	T3	Male	CBT	CBT member
R1	Male	CBT	CBT member	U3	Female	CBT	CBT member
S1	Male	CBT	CBT member	V3	Female	CBT	CBT member
T1	Male	Business	Owner	W3	Male	CBT	CBT member
U1	Male	CBT	CBT member	X3	Male	CBT	CBT member
V1	Female	CBT	CBT member	Y3	Male	CBT	CBT member
W1	Female	CBT	CBT member	Z3	Female	CBT	CBT member
X1	Female	CBT	CBT member	A4	Female	CBT	CBT member
Y1	Male	CBT	CBT member	B4	Female	CBT	CBT member
Z1	Male	Local Authority	Leader	C4	Male	CBT	CBT member
A2	Male	Local Authority	Leader	D4	Male	CBT	CBT member
B2	Male	Local Authority	Leader	E4	Male	CBT	CBT member
C2	Male	Local Authority	Leader

is the summary of informants’ characteristics quoted in this paper. This data analysis triangulation was applied to provide validity and reliability of the analysis. Additionally, the findings were discussed with key Krabi tourism stakeholders to confirm the results and to develop sustainable tourism policies to manage natural resources after the COVID-19 pandemic. The results of this process yielded the Five-Year (Year 2023–2027) and One-Year (Year 2023) Krabi Tourism Management Action Plans.

4. Results

The findings of this study are based on different perspectives of Krabi tourism stakeholders from in-depth interviews, focus group interviews, participated and non-participated observations, and formal meetings with the provincial tourism authority. Additionally, the results were also confirmed by key tourism stakeholders and employed to develop the Five-Year and One-Year Krabi Tourism Management Action Plans.

4.1. The Positive Impacts of COVID-19 on Krabi Tourism Industry in Thailand

Many works in tourism and sustainability (e.g., Pongsakornrungsilp et al. (2021) [3]; Sharma and Nicolau (2020) [55]; Zenker and Kock (2020) [56]) have demonstrated the crisis and negative impacts of COVID-19 on the economy, society, and environment, but there is still limited research on positive impacts from the pandemic. Our data revealed positive impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic below.

4.1.1. Recovery of Natural Resources

Interestingly, after the pandemic crisis in Krabi (see also [3]), natural resources in Krabi have significantly rehabilitated because those resources were not disturbed. The following example from one of Krabi tourism stakeholders who is still supporting the Krabi tourism industry mentions the recovery of natural resources.

“…it is not only a bad thing from COVID-19, but you can also get a good thing. You can see Whale sharks and blacktip reef sharks near the coast of Phi Phi Islands and Maya Beach. It is an indicator of recovery period. They are coming back, and we need to think how we can survive these resources…”

N (focus group interview, tourism management)

As mentioned by N, he demonstrated a sign of natural resource recovery from these indicators of natural resource abundance. Another tourism association member also shared her pictures of underwater reefs and marine animals to confirm the environmental recovery. However, it also raised concerns about how Krabi tourism stakeholders can sustain these natural resources after the COVID-19 pandemic.

4.1.2. Change in Tourism Management Ecology

After the discussion with Krabi tourism stakeholders, which Pongsakornrungsilp and Pongsakornrungsilp (2021) [16] called this group ‘Think Tanks’, small tourism businesses were less affected by the pandemic than medium or large businesses because of their small number of staff, lower operating costs, and higher flexibility. The following quote is an example from a hotel owner and a member of the tourism association in Krabi.

“…we closed our hotel and told our staffs to stay home. I and other hotel owners discussed the situation and we finally realized that we needed a diversification strategy. In the last five years, we have enjoyed a huge number of tourists visiting Krabi. We spent more investment to expand our businesses. But when the crisis happened, we faced the big damage…”

I (focus group interview, hotel owner)

It is not only an investment but also human resource management that they learned from the crisis. One hotel owner mentioned that

“…we don’t set up a formal organization structure anymore because it costs a lot of money. We try to find the optimal number of full-time staff and hire part-time staff when there are more tourists. We need multi-task skills staffs…”

A (focus group interview, hotel owner)

As mentioned by Pongsakornrungsilp et al. (2021) [3], it is a risk management strategy that tourism businesses learned from the crisis. The crisis has changed the business ecology and put pressure on tourism stakeholders to adopt survival strategies. However, it does not only affect tourism businesses, but also staff people who required multitasking skills in their employment.

Tourist behavior is another change in the tourism management ecology. With the hazard of the COVID-19 pandemic, tourists are concerned about their safety and health during their trips. Therefore, tourism businesses have to prepare services for a small group of tourists. They also have to include safety and health measures as well as handling tactics toward emergency situations.

4.1.3. Upskill and Reskill Development

During the break caused by COVID-19, many tourism businesses utilized that period to develop skills and competencies of their staff. One member of a tourism association mentioned that:

“…I know, someday our business is going to run, and the more who are ready, the higher opportunity to win the game. We keep a number of staff for running services. They were assigned to attend training programs. Even me, this is a good time to increase my knowledge and skills…”

K (focus group interview, hotel owner)

As mentioned by K, a hotel owner who has been affected by the pandemic, she urged her staff and herself to upskill and reskill during the off-season period. The results were clear when the COVID-19 restrictions were relieved, her business was among the first in Krabi that could re-start its operation and serve tourists.

4.2. Adapting Sustainable Tourism Management with Institutional Theory to Manage Uncertainty Situation in the Tourism Industry

The COVID-19 outbreak is not the first crisis in the tourism industry, and tourism stakeholders in many countries have learned about uncertain situations since SARS, Ebola, and Swine Flu [57]. Krabi tourism stakeholders also believe that they can survive and are ready to operate in the new normal. As mentioned by Bhaskara and Filimonau (2021) [58], tourism businesses can adopt different strategies to survive. However, the concern is how Krabi tourism stakeholders can sustain the natural resources that have recovered during the COVID-19 outbreak.

4.2.1. The Normative Institutional Process of Tourism Stakeholders in Managing Krabi Sustainable Tourism

Krabi tourism stakeholders have played an important role in driving sustainable tourism management with the Krabi Provincial Office since 2012 through the Krabi Declaration [15]. Presidents of Krabi Tourism Associations including Krabi Hotel Association, Krabi Tourism Business Association, Krabi Tourism Industry Council, Krabi Community-Based Tourism Association, and Lanta Tourism Business Association collaborated with Krabi province to develop policies and action plans. It is the normative institutional process that Font et al. (2019) [32] recommended as a compromised and collaboration process among tourism stakeholders.

Shared Values: The formation of a collaboration network among tourism stakeholders in the Krabi tourism industry is a co-creation process and has created shared values that all Krabi tourism stakeholders accept. It is in line with Font et al. (2019, 121) [32] that it is “…the right things to do.” The following example is from the former President of tourism associations:

“…here [Krabi] we are not a member or president of one tourism association. I was the President of several associations through the election of members. It is not a matter of which associations you are in or who the leaders of tourism associations are, we have the consensus shared values through the Krabi Declaration…”

L (in-depth interview, business owner and tourism association)

L also mentioned that to achieve green and sustainable tourism as announced in the Krabi Declaration, Krabi tourism stakeholders have to follow these shared values. This norm is shared and enriched from one generation to another in many tourism associations. It is a natural and gradual process by which tourism stakeholders participate in to co-create shared values.

Collaboration: Public and private sectors need to co-create not only shared values, but also collaborate to develop policies and plans. L also recommended that the Krabi government office and tourism stakeholders need to collaborate to drive sustainable tourism. It is in line with J, a government officer in tourism management, who said all stakeholders in both public and private sectors should support each other by employing their own resources and experiences to drive Krabi tourism. She also mentioned that:

“…as a government body, we cannot work individually despite the fact that we have the official authority in managing policy, budget, and action plans…Krabi Tourism Stakeholders are strong in the common set of values on ‘Sustainability’ and ‘Krabi Go Green’…and we work closely with each other to drive sustainable tourism…”

J (in-depth interview, a government officer)

Tourism stakeholders do not only co-create tourism policies with the government office, but also collaborate to promote tourism. Krabi tourism events have been organized by different tourism associations through government budget allocation. Additionally, the Krabi tourism stakeholders also collaborate to develop the Five-Year and One-Year Krabi Tourism Management Action Plans. As seen in the plans, green policy and sustainable tourism management are also driven through the provincial tourism management plans [59].

Krabi Declaration: It is not a direct process in developing the normative institution, but it is fundamental to shared values and collaboration. The first author participated in the Krabi Declaration development in 2012 and observed group discussions, which were classified by occupations and types of business. After announced in 2013, the Krabi Declaration has been employed by the Krabi tourism stakeholders as a scripture. It is worth noting that Krabi tourism stakeholders still follow the Declaration and share it with the next generation.

The institutional process did not directly apply for developing the sustainable tourism policies, but, instead, it has contributed learning process and experience to Krabi tourism stakeholders through different meetings and conferences since the announcement of Krabi Declaration. Krabi think tank is a group of experienced tourism stakeholders that play an important role to drive the institutional process among the stakeholders. This process created the culture of Krabi tourism stakeholders to focus on sustainable tourism as seen from L and J, because the roles and intentions of these stakeholders were voluntary as found in Peters et al. (2019) [33] that facilitated the institutional process.

4.2.2. Development of Tourism Management Plans

As mentioned earlier about the concern on the ability to sustain recovered natural resources after COVID-19, the Krabi tourism stakeholders urge the Krabi Tourism and Sports Office to proactively drive sustainable tourism based on research data. Therefore, the first author plays an important role in co-creating the Five-Year (Year 2023–2027) and One-Year (Year 2023) Krabi Tourism Management Action Plans by collaborating with the Krabi Government Offices and Krabi tourism stakeholders. To develop the tourism management plans, the Krabi tourism stakeholders including public and private sectors participated in the discussion on the policies and plans in two formal meetings based on the National Tourism Strategic Plan and the Andaman Tourism Cluster Strategic Plan. Additionally, six focus groups were conducted to provide insights from all tourism stakeholders. This plan can be demonstrated through the concept of sustainable tourism.

Environmental aspect: The Carbon Neutral Management, Health and Safety for Next Normal, and Facility development strategies are discussed in order to manage the post-pandemic environment. During the re-opening period post COVID-19, Krabi tourism stakeholders focused on the environment after realizing significant natural resource recovery in various destinations, which urges them to drive sustainability. Carbon neutral tourism is discussed among the Krabi tourism stakeholders in responding to a call for net-zero carbon footprint from the business partners in Europe. W, a hotel owner, and a tourism association member, mentioned that:

“…carbon neutral tourism will be the mechanism in driving Krabi sustainable tourism because carbon neutral tourism activities can reduce impacts on natural resources, and also be able to increase green areas…”

W (focus group interview, hotel owner and tourism association)

As mentioned by W, Krabi tourism stakeholders discussed strategies to drive sustainability after the recovery of natural resources and strongly believed that carbon neutral tourism can nourish the natural resources and also expand forest and mangrove areas in Krabi province.

Additionally, the Krabi tourism stakeholders also focus on boosting tourists’ confidence in health and safety, and promoting beautiful natural resources in Krabi. Therefore, developing tourism management plans in this period requires risk management as a guideline. The plans also highlight landscape management and city plan in terms of attractiveness, safety, hygiene, waste management, and sewage water management. The following example is from a hotel owner at Ao Nang, Krabi about the environmental concern.

“…our destinations are charming, but how can we sell this charm? We need to attract international tourists after the COVID-19 pandemic. How about the transportation system and facilities; e.g., car park, CCTV, souvenir shops, attraction points, and so on? We have to do it as soon as possible…”

I (focus group interview, hotel owner)

From this perspective, infrastructures and facilities need to be prepared for tourists who are going to visit Krabi after the pandemic.

Social aspect: This aspect is mostly related to the community-based tourism (CBT) because most tourism destinations are in local communities and local traditions can attract tourists to co-create experiences during leisure time [60]. The CBT is a mechanism for strengthening the local culture, tradition, and way of life as seen from the Tung Yee Peng CBT where the CBT members focus on preserving the mangrove forest and low carbon tourism activities [16,26,61]. Therefore, Human Capital Development and Balanced Tourism are key social aspects in driving sustainability.

“…local community has a strong culture and tradition, myth, local identity, and way of life. We do community-based tourism to preserve nature, not for money. Running tourism activities can increase the awareness of natural resource protection, and the green area also increases…Thus, we need to share our knowledge and experience with other CBTs and tourism society.”

N (focus group interview, the CBT member)

N shared his experience in driving the CBT and found that knowledge and understanding of tourism management led to sustainable tourism. However, balanced tourism between tourism businesses and local communities is another key factor to support sustainable tourism. The following example is from S, a CBT member in Krabi to mention balanced tourism.

“…generating tourism income should concern shared income to local communities. If the CBT members see the benefits of tourism, they will participate and support all activities.”

S (focus group interview, the CBT member)

Although S mentioned the economic aspect, he focused on balanced tourism in terms of benefit sharing. Whenever CBT members gain benefits from CBT activities, they are willing to participate in sustainable activities. Both human capital development and balanced tourism contribute to the direct and indirect participation of local communities in managing tourism. The more they understand the benefits, the more they are willing to preserve natural resources.

Economic aspect: This aspect is the direct benefit of running tourism. It is accessible and measurable. One motivation to visit Krabi is to experience the beauty of plenty tourism resources (e.g., underwater scenes, beaches, cultures, and gastronomy), especially after the recovery of the natural resources. Therefore, the Krabi tourism stakeholders have to communicate with tourists about how enchanting the scenery and natural resources are. The low carbon tourism activities (e.g., kayaking, sailing, planting reefs and seagrasses, and other responsible tourism activities) play an important role in driving sustainability in which Krabi tourism stakeholders have promised through the Krabi Declaration. One of Krabi tourism stakeholders also mentioned this issue below:

“…what are we going to tell our target tourists? We need to think in terms of branding and co-creating experience by urging tourists to participate in the local way of life activities and low carbon tourism activities. We can earn revenue from tourism, and gain recognition as a green destination that can attract quality tourists from Europe, especially Scandinavia…”

O (focus group interview, hotel owner)

During the discussion, O mentioned that Krabi tourism stakeholders should employ branding and communication to attract tourists and design tourism experience through a value co-creation process. Low carbon tourism activities play an important role in co-creating the culture of Krabi tourism because these activities do not only contribute financial value but also create a strong brand identity for a sustainable tourism destination.

However, planning through sustainable lens, Krabi tourism stakeholders cannot focus on one aspect; all aspects–environment, social, and economic should be integrated. The following quote is an example from one of the Krabi Think Tank members.

“…we should learn from our lesson. We have long concerned about environment and focus on the quality market that make us become the top fourth of Thailand tourism destination. We gain both sustainability and also the strong economy of Krabi Province. In this way, we need to keep focus on environment through Krabi Go Green…”

L (in-depth interview, business owner and tourism association)

As mentioned by L, he is an experienced stakeholder who always remind Krabi tourism stakeholders about Krabi Declaration 2013 and the positioning of Krabi Tourism regarding to low carbon destination and also carbon neutral tourism. This opinion was supported by M1, a hotel owner and also tourism organization representative.

“…Thanks again for including the CBT in the Krabi tourism plan… economic aspect is our last thing to concern. We ask ourself, ‘What do we want from running tourism?’ We would like to protect our mangrove, local traditional and culture, and also our rituals and traditions within the community…”

M1 (focus group interview, a hotel owner and tourism association)

As mentioned by M1, the CBT is an example of focusing on all aspects of sustainable tourism. The more the CBT focuses on all aspects, the longer the CBT can sustain environment, social and economic of the community. Moreover, the future of the pandemic is uncertainty that there is no precious prediction method to explain what exactly situation will be [62]. Sustainable management in terms of environment, social, and economic is one of the best ways to deal with this uncertainty.

5. Summary and Discussions

This paper is to respond to Tan et al. (2018) [8], Zhang et al. (2020) [9], Pardo (2020) [10], and Sivapalan et al. (2021) [11] by providing additional perspective to understand how sustainable tourism management can be applied to manage the COVID-19 impact. Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, the tourism industry around the world has been heavily affected by the pandemic resulting in a decline in incomes and increase in unemployment, especially within local communities. Despite many negative consequences from the pandemic, this global disruption has brought about several positive effects on the environment and climate worldwide (e.g., improved air quality, reduced water pollution and noise) due to a significant reduction in social and economic activities. In terms of environmental impact related to tourism, the decline in tourist activities has given time for natural resources to recover (e.g., reef restoration, increase in wildlife activities). The question becomes how the tourism industry can employ sustainable tourism management to maintain those recovered natural resources and prevent future damages. The in-depth and focus group interviews as well as observations data revealed that, through the institutional process, tourism stakeholders can develop strategies to manage sustainable tourism (Proposition 1) and co-create policies to manage natural resources after the pandemic (Preposition 2). The next section discusses the theoretical contributions and practical implications from this study.

5.1. Theoretical Contributions

This paper adds to the existing literature on sustainable tourism management [8,9,10,11] by looking at how sustainable tourism management can be applied to manage recovered natural resources after the COVID-19 crisis, which is considered a positive impact from the pandemic. Through the theoretical lenses of institutional theory, this research shows that tourism stakeholders can co-create tourism policies to respond to sustainable issues using the institutional process. Scott’s (1995) [47] institutional theory identified three pillars of an institution—regulative, normative, and cognitive. This research expands Scott (1995) [47] proposal in the tourism context by offering key insights into managing Krabi sustainable tourism through normative institutional process, which consists of shared values and collaboration among the tourism stakeholders. With Krabi Declaration being a fundamental concept, the stakeholders form collaboration network and co-create shared values that everyone (both private and public sectors) should follow [16,32]. In addition, the stakeholders also need to collaborate in developing sustainable tourism policies and plans to be executed after the COVID-19 crisis and shared with future generations.

This research expands on Peter et al. (2019) [33] research by using institutional theory to develop policies and a sustainable tourism management plan post-COVID-19 pandemic and recommend a way that tourism stakeholders can respond to sustainability changes [32]. In order to develop a successful sustainable tourism management plan, we propose that the plan should consist of three aspects-environmental, social, and economic. Tourism stakeholders should collaborate to protect the recovered natural resources and focus on carbon neutral tourism to minimize the impacts on the environment. Moreover, a successful plan needs to involve local communities because they bring in culture, traditions, and ways of life to co-create experience with the tourists through community-based tourism (CBT) [16,26,61]. Lastly, a sustainable tourism management plan should provide an economic impact on the local community.

Furthermore, this research found positive impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on natural resources and local tourism in Thailand. Confirming existing research on positive impacts on the environment [63], the interview data revealed that local natural resource conditions in Krabi province significantly improved during the COVID-19 pandemic due to low human and tourist activities. On the business side, the pandemic also gave many business owners an opportunity to re-think their business and risk management strategies by figuring out an optimal number of full-time vs. part-time employee ratio in order to minimize large operation expenses. For those employees whom they still hired, the downtime during the pandemic gave them time to refresh or improve their skills by attending various training programs. Additionally, this study also found that to reduce the risk of tourists within the uncertainty situation, health measure should be emphasized in all tourism businesses to increase tourists’ confidence and purchase intention [64].

5.2. Practical Implications

This study provides recommendations for tourism stakeholders including policy makers, tourism associations, local businesses, and local communities. To develop successful sustainable tourism management plans and policies, especially after a crisis like the COVID-19 pandemic, all parties should use the institutional process to co-create shared values and collaboration in order to protect and manage natural resources. We recommend that tourism stakeholders work closely with the natural resource management department to co-create tourist experience while still preserving natural resources and protecting the environment. Other tourist destinations that rely on natural resources in Thailand and other countries can develop a similar sustainable tourism management plan by collaborating with other local government units and stakeholders. Carbon neutral tourism where the destinations generate net-zero carbon footprint is one way to drive sustainability in the tourist destinations. Regarding carbon neutral tourism, the economic aspect overlaps with the environmental aspect by employing low carbon activities as tourist activities to co-create experience, pleasure, and fun during the leisure activities. Tourism associations and local businesses can promote carbon neutral tourism activities such as kayaking, sailing, planting reefs and seagrasses. Hotel and restaurant owners can also use locally sourced ingredients. Transportation systems can adopt electric vehicles or improve public transport facilities and infrastructures. Lastly, according to our findings, the local destination should invest in landscape, waste, water, and sewer management to enhance safety and hygiene of the destination.

5.3. Limitations and Future Research Directions

Similar to every research, this study has certain limitations. The findings in this research are based on focus group interviews with different tourism stakeholders including government officers, hotel owners, restaurant owners, tourism business managers, and community-based tourism (CBT) members in Krabi province, which might have limited the generalizability of the findings. Thus, future research should interview stakeholders in other tourist destinations to generalize and strengthen the findings. Moreover, this study uses a qualitative approach to find out key insights on development of strategies to manage sustainable tourism. Future study may use a quantitative approach such as a survey to collect data with a wider range of stakeholders to follow up on the proposed sustainability management plan and policies in order to measure the effectiveness of the plan.