Scuba diving tourism


Scuba diving tourism is the industry based on servicing the requirements of recreational divers at destinations other than where they live. It includes aspects of training, equipment sales, rental and service, guided experiences and environmental tourism.
Motivations to travel for scuba diving are complex and may vary considerably during the diver's development and experience. Participation can vary from once off to multiple dedicated trips per year over several decades. The popular destinations fall into several groups, including tropical reefs, shipwrecks and cave systems, each frequented by its own group of enthusiasts, with some overlap. Temperate and inland open water reef sites are generally dived by people who live relatively nearby.
The industry provides both tangible and intangible goods and services. The tangible component includes provision of equipment for rental and for sale, while intangibles include education and skill development, safety and convenience by way of dive charter services and guide services on dives. Customer satisfaction is largely dependent on the quality of services provided, and personal communication has a strong influence on the popularity of specific service providers in a region.
Scuba diving tourism is a growth industry, and it is necessary to consider environmental sustainability, as the expanding impact of divers can adversely affect the marine environment in several ways, and the impact also depends on the specific environment. The same pleasant sea conditions that allow development of relatively delicate and highly diverse ecologies also attract the greatest number of tourists, including divers who dive infrequently, exclusively on vacation and never fully develop the skills to dive in an environmentally friendly way. Several studies have found the main reason for contact by inexperienced divers to be poor buoyancy control, and that damage to reefs by divers can be minimized by modifying the behavior of those divers. Several methodologies have been developed with the intention of minimising the environmental impact of divers on coral reefs so that the industry can continue to develop sustainably.
Scuba diving is an equipment intensive activity, requiring significant capital outlay to establish a retail outlet with the expected range of equipment and filling facilities. Dive boats are a large capital expense, with high running costs. There are also health and safety aspects for the operator and the customer. Adequate quality control is necessary to avoid providing a harmful product. The cost of qualifying as a diving instructor is significant in time and money. Economic sustainability is affected by environmental awareness and conservation, service delivery and customer satisfaction, and sustainable business management. Liability issues can be managed by the use of waivers, declarations of medical fitness to dive, adherence to industry best standards, and public liability insurance.

History

The history of scuba diving tourism is linked to the history of scuba equipment development and availability, and to the development of training systems that opened up the activity to sufficient numbers to support the industry. Key equipment developments include swimfins, which give the diver underwater mobility and free the hands for other functions, the diving mask, which provides underwater vision, the open circuit regulator, a simple and reliable breathing gas source, the buoyancy compensator, which allows the diver to swim comfortably above the bottom, and float at the surface, wetsuit, a simple and easy to use protection from moderately cold water, submersible pressure gauge, allowing easy monitoring of remaining breathing gas, dive computers, and nitrox breathing gas, both of which allowed longer dives without decompression.
The growth of the diving industry in a region tends to follow a logistic curve, with a slow start and mostly established, experienced divers with relatively high skill levels exploring a new area where there is little supporting infrastructure. As the area becomes popular, the infrastructure develops and the growth accelerates until it is limited by carrying capacity is approached. By this time the main diver demography has shifted towards the inexperienced and often uncertified diver, with low skill levels and a greater tendency to damage the environment due to ignorance and lack of basic diving skills. Beyond this stage the situation may stabilise if managed well, or if not, the deterioration in value to the tourist may cause a reduction in popularity and a loss of trade.
Too much competition for customers amongst a large number of diving service providers in a region can lead to low profit margins and pressure on struggling companies to cut costs by following unsustainable diving practices and providing substandard equipment. A reduction in numbers may lead to more cooperation between the remaining companies, and a greater willingness to follow sustainable practices.
The shape of the curve will vary depending on the region. Areas with more resilient ecologies may see larger numbers while remaining viable, while areas with sensitive ecologies may suffer early collapse. Climate change is likely to render many areas more sensitive to diver impact and most will probably have a reduction in carrying capacity based on limits of acceptable change. The sites that remain viable for longer may receive the overflow from sites which suffer ecological collapse, putting them under greater stress as the less competent divers flood areas that were previously less attractive to them.

Motivation

The motivations of scuba divers to travel have been attributed to adventure, learning, escape, social interaction, stature, challenge and excitement, and while these are probably valid for most novice divers and some long term divers, the motivation of long term enthusiasts may be more complex. The development of a recreational diver from novice to experienced diver is usually associated with acquisition and improvement of skills, and is often accompanied by a shift in motivations to dive. Similarly, expectations of the diving experience, satisfaction with the experience available at different dive sites, and attitudes towards the underwater environment will change in divers who continue to dive over the longer term and relatively frequently. The desire to improve and learn for personal growth and the long term satisfaction and fulfilment derived from this learning is common in such divers. This could be an important factor informing the planning and management of diving tourism.

Destinations

Three main classes of recreational diving tourism destinations exist. These are tropical reefs, shipwrecks, and cave systems. Each caters to a different clientele, though there is some overlap. Temperate reefs are less popular as tourist attractions, but can have their own enthusiasts, including short range tourism and incidental dive tourism associated with general tourism in the region. Any exceptional dive site may be visited by expeditionary dive tourists once the attractions are known, though these destinations are generally not serviced by mainstream tourism service providers.

Regions where recreational diving is a major tourist industry

There are a few regions where international diver tourism is a significant part of the economy They are mostly tropical areas with extensive coral reefs and predictable weather and water conditions, and often have relatively undeveloped industrial economies.
  • Great Barrier Reef of Australia
  • The Red Sea
  • *Hurghada is one of the diving destinations on the Red Sea with rich marine biodiversity, good visibility, a variety of dive sites suitable for different skill levels, including historic shipwrecks, and is accessible at all times of the year.
  • The Caribbean Sea
  • Indonesia
  • Thailand
  • The Coral Triangle of southeast Asia:
  • *The Philippines
  • *Malaysia
Other regions are also popular for diving, but the relative importance of scuba tourism is lower. There are a very large number of dive sites in Europe, and also in parts of the US, reflecting the origins of the activity and a large fraction of the tourists.

Tropical coral reefs

Tropical coral reefs are popular recreational diving tourism destinations, as they are generally both pleasant and colorful to dive, relatively low in serious hazards, and the water is at a comfortable temperature, so they attract divers of all levels of competence. They are more easily damaged by poor diving skills than some temperate reefs, where the environment is more robust due to rougher sea conditions and fewer fragile, slow-growing organisms. The same pleasant sea conditions that allow development of relatively delicate and highly diverse ecologies also attract the greatest number of tourists, including divers who dive infrequently, exclusively on vacation and never fully develop the skills to dive in an environmentally friendly way. Low impact diving training has been shown to be effective in reducing diver contact.
Regions include:
Wreck diving is recreational diving where the wreckage of ships, aircraft and other artificial structures are explored. Although most wreck dive sites are at shipwrecks, there is an increasing trend to scuttle retired ships to create artificial reef sites. Diving to crashed aircraft can also be considered wreck diving. The recreation of wreck diving makes no distinction as to how the vessel ended up on the bottom. Some wreck diving involves penetration of the wreckage, making a direct ascent to the surface impossible for a part of the dive.
Wreck diving may be divided into three categories of differing hazard and skill and certification requirement:
  • Non-penetration diving
  • Limited penetration diving, within the "light zone"
  • Full penetration diving, beyond the "light zone"
The inherent hazards of wreck diving may be aggravated by local circumstances like depth, layout and condition of the wreck, the silting hazard, and general sea conditions such as visibility, illumination, surge and currents, and water temperature. Training for wreck diving may be marketed as an associated service.