Journal of Cleaner Production 376 (2022) 134284

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Journal of Cleaner Production

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Ecotourism strategy of UNESCO city in Iran: Applying a new quantitative

method integrated with BWM
Elnaz Tajer , Sara Demir *
Department of Landscape Architecture, Bursa Technical University, Bursa, Turkey

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Handling Editor: Mingzhou Jin The preservation of the integrity of ecological and cultural resource values with tourism potential and the
reduction of visitor and environmental pressures on these values are achieved by sustainable tourism develop­
Keywords: ment. In this context, ecotourism is a sustainable and responsible type of tourism that can protect the tourism
Ecotourism resources and consequently, develops the socio-economic conditions of the country including those of local
Quantitative SWOT analysis
people. In this study, Masouleh village, located in the northeast of Iran with sensitive-fragile vegetation and
Multi-criteria decision making
wildlife protected on an international and national scale and known for its local architecture and traditional
Best and worst method (BWM)
Masouleh-Iran lifestyle, was selected as the study area. However, the lack of a tourism plan, insufficient investment in tourism,
insufficient technical infrastructure, and uncontrolled increase in land prices have negatively affected these
sensitive ecological and cultural landscape values. The methodology of this research included field survey, in­
terviews, and strengths-weaknesses-opportunities-threats (SWOT) analysis with Best and Worst Method (BWM)
conducted with experts and local people to rank ecotourism strategies according to their priority. Among the 4
main and 10 sub-ecotourism criteria, S1 “the presence of vegetation and wildlife” and Q4 “being on the UNESCO
tentative list” were the highest priority strategies for the development of ecotourism. This study also proposed a
quantitative integrated method model that listing priorities for successful ecotourism strategies of the region.

1. Introduction cultural resources coexist, are frequently preferred for ecotourism

Today, the tourism sector has attracted great attention in the world,
and many countries have become more aware of the contribution of the
alternative tourism, which puts less pressure on natural and cultural
resources (Hosseini et al., 2021a; Neger, 2021). Increasing mass tourism
activities around the world and their negative impact on the environ­
ment, culture, and society have foregrounded the concept of sustainable
tourism. Therefore, the concept of sustainable tourism emerged in the
1980s against mass tourism, which had put pressure on the natural,
socio-cultural and ecological environment, and sustainable tourism is
based on the principle of conservation-utilization of resources. Based on
the principle of sustainability, ecotourism is environmentally sensitive;
and respectful tourism that supports local development minimizes the
pressure on the natural, historical, and local landscape values of the
tourism destination (Neger, 2021; Sahani, 2021; Wang et al., 2021).
Ecotourism, which, in turn, includes alternative tourism types, is a
type of tourism that entails both natural and cultural tourism elements
(Zorlu and Yilmaz, 2020; Sahani, 2021). Rural areas, where natural and
practices. These areas still preserve the local lifestyle within these
landscape values, they are remarkable destinations for the ectourism
sector, and the popularity of these areas is increasing day by day. Ur­
banization levels of rural areas, which preserve their local texture and
historical heritage, are significantly lower than in big cities. These areas
have a high level distinctive environment that attracts city-dwellers who
are fed up with the fast-paced lifestyle and environmental pollution
(Shang et al., 2020). Thus, these areas attract great attention from
ecotourists, especially as ecotourism destinations (Stamatiou et al.,
2020). Due to the Covid-19 pandemic that started in 2019, interest in
nature, local products, historical values, and agriculture has increased.
This state has increased the orientation towards rural areas with
ecological and cultural landscape resources (Hosseini et al., 2021b).
Hence, the development of ecotourism in rural areas provides employ­
ment and additional income to the local people, increases the standard
of living and public income, and prevents migration to metropolitan
cities (Nasehi et al., 2017). Thus, ecotourism serves both as a local
development tool and a conservation tool by meeting the

* Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: elnaz.tjr28@gmail.com (E. Tajer), sara.demir@btu.edu.tr (S. Demir).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2022.134284
Received 30 March 2022; Received in revised form 16 August 2022; Accepted 19 September 2022
Available online 26 September 2022
0959-6526/© 2022 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
E. Tajer and S. Demir
socio-economic needs of the region and preserving its natural and cul­
tural values and historical heritage (Yilmaz et al., 2009; Demir et al.,
2016; Demir and Atanur, 2019; Zorlu and Yilmaz, 2020; Sahani, 2021).
Therefore, ecotourism, which is protection-oriented, includes the ele­
ments of nature tourism, rural tourism, and cultural tourism and sup­
ports the local socio-culturally and economically. In this context, to
pinpoint areas with ecotourism potential, resource analysis studies
revealing ecotourism criteria were carried out, and ecotourism strate­
gies were also developed by identifying potential areas (Stamatiou et al.,
2020; Hosseini et al., 2021a; Neger, 2021; Sahani, 2021; Wang et al.,
2021).
In addition to natural landscape values, the local architectural
pattern plays a seminal role in cultural values and has unique structural
features reflecting the lifestyle of the region; and is an important phys­
ical feature in the tourism sector (Pratheep, 2013; Farnian, 2016). In this
context, local architecture is an important element of identity that
makes the cultural landscape visible, and is, then, very effective on the
perception of the region by the visitors (Moons et al., 2020). The concept
of sustainability, which affects the architecture industry as well as
tourism, enables visitors to prefer accommodation facilities that are
respectful to nature, consume less energy, produce zero carbon, are built
with local materials, and have a sustainable local architectural pattern
(Pratheep, 2013; Farnian, 2016).
For a tourism destination to attract the attention of tourists, it must
be unique with its original natural and cultural values (Demir and
Atanur, 2019; Asadpourian et al., 2020; Wang et al., 2021). Iran has
ecotourism potential due to its natural and unspoiled landscape values,
different climate types, diversity of plant and animal species, biodiver­
sity, and the existence of different traditional cultures. For this reason,
ecotourism is an important tourism sector that can contribute to the
development of the country (Hosseini et al., 2021a). In this study,
Masouleh village, which is located in Gilan province in the north of Iran
and has a deep-rooted historical landscape character, was chosen as the
study area. Contrary to studies that have only addressed the sustainable
architectural structure of Masouleh village until today, within the scope
of this study, the natural, cultural, historical values and the traditional
texture of the area were evaluated together within the scope of
ecotourism for the first time. This study aims to determine the
ecotourism criteria that reveal the potentials and constraints of
Masouleh village and develop appropriate ecotourism strategies for the
development of ecotourism. To achieve this aim, the priorities of
ecotourism strategies were determined in the area. In this context, the
ecotourism criteria determined were evaluated by integrating the SWOT
Analysis (strengths-weaknesses-opportunities-threats) and the Best
Worst Method (BWM) for the first time. Within this scope, ecotourism
criteria were listed in the main and sub-criteria of the SWOT analysis,
and each criterion was listed according to its priorities with BWM. Thus,
effective and sustainable strategies could be proposed for sustainable
development in this area. As a result, the methods and results of the
study are suitable for the village of Masouleh, which has unique natural
and cultural landscape resources and sustainable local architecture, to
protect the values that provide a source for ecotourism and to improve
the living welfare of the local people.
The structure of the present study is as follows: in Section 2, a
literature review on the current research topic and research methods
was carried out through which the original value of the work was
indicated. In Section 3, natural and cultural landscape resources of the
study area, which constitute a source value for ecotourism, were intro­
duced. In Section 4, the materials and methods used in the research were
detailed. Section 5 deals with the results of the study. In Section 6, the
results were discussed, limitations as well as recommendations were
stated. The research was finally concluded with section 7 that brought
concluding remarks.
2
Journal of Cleaner Production 376 (2022) 134284
2. Literature review
In this section; an almost comprehensive literature review involving
ecotourism and other sustainable tourism studies integrating SWOT
analysis and multi-criteria decision-making analyses (1) were done to
discuss the study subjects using BWM (2).
2.1. Applying SWOT and MCDM in ecotourism and other sustainable
tourism
For the ecotourism development carried out in ecologically and
culturally rich areas, ecotourism planning should be made and
ecotourism strategies should be developed accordingly (Demir and
Atanur, 2019; Wang et al., 2021). Additionally, healthy visitor and field
management are required to ensure the balance of protection and use. In
this context, a protective approach has been developed against low
visitor numbers and natural and cultural landscape values in areas with
ecotourism potential. Areas with ecological and/or culturally protected
historical heritage value, local architectural structure, traditional
texture, geographical features, and rich biological diversity in the world
and Iran have been determined as areas with ecotourism potential
(Moharamnejad and Nourbakhsh, 2016, Masih et al., 2020). In many of
the pertinent studies in the field of ecotourism, SWOT analysis with
qualitative features has widely been used (Nasehi et al., 2017; Shang
et al., 2020; Gerami and Hosseini, 2021). However, not all components
of this subjective analysis have weights. Therefore, the process of
determining the development strategies of the field does not work
objectively unless the weights of the components is measured. For this
reason, applications that integrate and rank SWOT analysis with
multi-criteria decision-making methods have been developed to elimi­
nate this deficiency of SWOT analysis and increase its effectiveness in
the decision-making process (Moharamnejad and Nourbakhsh, 2016;
Ajmera, 2017; Popović et al., 2018; 2021; Asadpourian et al., 2020;
Buyukozkan et al., 2021; Hosseini et al., 2021b). Within this scope,
ecotourism planning and strategies integrating SWOT analysis and
MCDM methods have been carried out in recent years in the literature to
evaluate the potential of ecotourism areas with natural and cultural
features (Demir et al., 2016; Moharamnejad and Nourbakhsh, 2016;
Demir and Atanur, 2019; Stamatiou et al., 2020; Zorlu and Yilmaz,
2020; Hosseini et al., 2021a, 2021b; Neger, 2021; Sahani, 2021; Wang
et al., 2021). MCDM is widely used to solve complex problems, often
with conflicting criteria (Nawaz et al., 2018; Ozdemir Isik and Demir,
2017; Pourebrahim and Amoushahi, 2017; Milošević et al., 2018; Sta­
matiou et al., 2020; Cvetković and Šljivović, 2021, Lee et al., 2021). This
integrated method offers a quantitative objective approach to the
qualitative subjective approach that reflects the positive and negative
aspects of the internal and external factors of the field. Studies con­
ducted in recent years with SWOT Analysis and MCDM method related
to ecotourism and other sustainable tourism are examined in detail in
this section. General information about the reviewed literature is shown
in Table 1.
Ajmera et al. (2015) highlighted the strengths, weaknesses, oppor­
tunities, and threats (SWOT) of health tourism in India: However, these
SWOT outputs were prioritized with the multi-criteria decision-making
technique. Unlike other qualitative and subjective studies, the results
obtained gave quantitative and objective results. After determining the
ecotourism criteria in a conservation area in Turkey using SWOT anal­
ysis, Demir et al. (2016) integrated the SWOT analysis outputs with AHP
in objectively determining the appropriate ecotourism strategies. This
study emphasized that with AHP based on the pairwise comparison, the
questions of the questionnaire increased in number and this could
decrease the accuracy rate. In their research, Pourebrahim and
Amoushahi (2017) determined internal factors (strengths and weak­
nesses) and external factors (opportunities and threats) for the
ecotourism development of Mahallat, Iran. Afterwards, they integrated
Analytic Network Process (ANP) and decision-making trial and
E. Tajer and S. Demir Journal of Cleaner Production 376 (2022) 134284

Table 1 offer a systematic approach. Lee et al. (2021) preferred the A’WOT
Examples of SWOT Analysis and MCDM Methods in ecotourism and other sus­ (AHP/SWOT) hybrid approach to boost tourism in a fishing village and
tainable tourism areas. identify important ecotourism factors. Thus, in the digital environment,
Researchers Methodology Research area they determined the regions in which tourism should develop. Buyu­
Ajmera et al. (2015) SWOT- AHP India
kozkan et al. (2021) firstly conducted a SWOT analysis to determine the
Demir at al. (2016) SWOT- AHP Turkey potential and risks of health tourism in Turkey. They quantified each
Pourebrahim and Amoushahi SWOT- ANP- DEMATEL Iran SWOT component with hesitant fuzzy linguistics to determine the best
(2017) health tourism strategy. In their study, Cvetković and Šljivović (2021)
Ajmera (2017) SWOT- TOPSIS India
determined the tourism strategies that should be considered a priority
Stamatiou et al. (2017) SWOT- AHP Greece
Milošević et al. (2018) SWOT- AHP Eastern for the development of ecotourism in the Serbian case. For this, an
Serbia approach that integrates the AHP method and SWOT analysis was used.
Popović et al. (2018) SWOT-SWARA Serbia The ease and importance of the AHP-SWOT application are emphasized.
Demir and Atanur (2019) SWOT- AHP Turkey
Stamatiou et al. (2020) SWOT- AHP Greece
Asadpourian et al. (2020) SWOT-AHP-TOWS Iran
2.2. The application areas of BWM
Popović et al. (2021) SWOT- extended Serbia
PIPRECIA In all of the tourism-related studies mentioned in Table 1, SWOT
Lee et al. (2021) SWOT- AHP A Rural Area analysis alone was not sufficient for a scientific study, and quantitative
Buyukozkan et al. (2021) SWOT- AHP-MABAC Turkey
data were supported by qualitative data especially by MCDM methods.
Cvetković and Šljivović (2021) SWOT- AHP Serbia
Thus, more applicable, realistic, and systematic decisions have been
obtained. AHP, which is one of the most preferred MCDM methods in
evaluation laboratory (DEMATEL) techniques to prioritize these factors tourism research, is studied only with a limited number of criteria
and develop strategies for ecotourism development. This method was (maximum 9). Studies have revealed that as the number of criteria
considered to be useful in making ecotourism decisions aimed at the increased, the pairwise comparison questions increased, which, in turn,
development of the city of Mahallat, which is famous for its flower decreased the intelligibility of the study. This situation was determined
gardens. It is stated in the research that the ANP technique, which is to reduce the accuracy of the studies and, therefore, the repetition of the
used in environmental planning studies and can evaluate all dependent survey causes a waste of time (Demir et al., 2016; Ozdemir Işık and
and independent criteria together, is more effective than AHP, which Demir, 2017; Demir and Atanur, 2019; Asadpourian et al., 2020). In this
establishes a one-way hierarchical relationship between the criteria. In context, the Best and Worst Method (BWM) was developed by Rezaei
the study of Ajmera (2017), SWOT analysis was used to determine the (2014, 2016) to overcome the shortcomings of AHP and other MCDM
strategies within the scope of health tourism in India, but she integrated methods. It is very important that this method, which has less pairwise
the SWOT outputs with the TOPSIS technique to rank these strategies comparisons, is easy to understand, has a high accuracy rate, and does
according to their importance priorities. Milošević et al. (2018) aimed to not cause waste of time. Therefore, it has become a preferred method in
prioritize appropriate strategies for the development of ecotourism in prioritizing criteria in scientific research conducted in different fields in
regional development in Eastern Serbia. In their study, SWOT analysis recent years. With the BWM, which is a multi-criteria decision making
was used to evaluate the ecotourism potential of important natural re­ (MCDM) method and developed by Dr. Jafar Razaei, all criteria are
sources. For the development of tourism, these strategies, which provide compared according to the best and worst criteria selected, and the
the development of tourism with the AHP method, are listed according importance weights of each criterion are determined flexibly (Rezaei,
to their priorities. In their study, Popović et al. (2018) used the 2014, 2016). Researchers stated that BWM, which is a more consistent
SWOT-SWARA analysis to prioritize strategies that support the devel­ and time-saving method in scientific research, is more effective and has
opment of tourism in the Sokobanja Spa region. However, the criteria higher consistency. In this study, some studies using this method based
were not compared as in the AHP technique. The results of the study on pairwise comparison were examined. Table 2 includes some studies
were determined to be reliable. In their study, Demir and Atanur (2019) using the BWM method.
determined problems and opportunities in natural and cultural land­ In their study, Askarifar et al. (2018) evaluated investment oppor­
scape values of a district in Turkey by SWOT analysis to develop an tunities on Iran’s Mokran coast, encouraged entrepreneurial activities,
ecotourism strategy in that district with natural and archaeological and developed the necessary infrastructures. In this context, 22 invest­
value in Turkey. They digitized the verbal outputs of this analysis with ment opportunities deemed suitable for the study area were listed with
AHP to specify the strategies necessary for the development of BWM and the one that was most suitable to be implemented was
ecotourism. Ecotourism strategies were developed for sensitive land­ determined. In the study of Abadi et al. (2018), the BWM method was
scape areas. The study emphasized that the excess of criteria in com­ preferred for the development of health tourism in the Yazd province of
parisons with AHP would reduce the accuracy of the study. In the first Iran. After determining the strategic importance of the study area for
step in determining the ecotourism strategies of rural forest villages in health tourism, tourism strategies were determined practically with
Greece, Stamatiou et al. (2020) compared each of the SWOT components BWM. A study by Zolfani et al. (2019) revealed a BWM-WASPS-based
with the AHP and listed them according to their importance. It was hybrid MCDM model that was applied to determine the most suitable
stated that this A’WOT hybrid technique, which was carried out with a location for a 5-star hotel in Shahrekord, Iran. The study concluded that
participatory approach, could be a useful and effective method for the BWM is the best analytical approach. Kumar et al. (2020) aimed to
development of ecotourism strategies in rural forest areas. Asadpourian determine the criteria necessary to evaluate the green performance of
et al. (2020) applied SWOT-AHP-TOWS Analysis to fill the research gap airports. Within this scope, the importance priority of each criterion was
for the development of sustainable ecotourism in western Iran. In the determined by BWM and VIKOR methods. The researchers stated that
study, the strategies that should be applied for ecotourism were pre­ this integrated method is a more consistent and time-saving method. In
sented and listed. It was discussed that this method increases the number their study, Rahimi et al. (2020) applied a fuzzy group BWM to deter­
of pairwise comparison questions and may decrease the accuracy of the mine the criteria required for the selection of the most suitable site of a
study. Within the scope of the study, Popović et al. (2021) determined landfill, and the importance priority of each criterion was determined.
the advantages and disadvantages of tourism in Serbia within the scope These criteria were processed spatially in the GIS environment and
of planning tourism orientation development strategies in the region. suitability maps for the landfill were created. The research states that
They developed a model proposal for the development of tourism in BWM reflects the decisions made by planners and decision-makers more
Serbia by integrating the SWOT and extended PIPRECIA methods, which effectively, objectively, and realistically and gives high accuracy results.

3
E. Tajer and S. Demir Journal of Cleaner Production 376 (2022) 134284

Table 2 ((Demir et al., 2016; Ozdemir I and Demir, 2017; Demir and Atanur,
A Summary of the areas where the BWM method is used. 2019; Asadpourian et al., 2020). For this reason, there is a need for an
References Research objects Methodology Research easily applicable, effective, and realistic MCDM method with few pair­
area wise comparison questions. Table 2 gives information about the usage
Askarifar Investment in seashore BWM- TOPSIS Iran areas and purposes of the studies made with BWM, which is highly
et al. reliable, easy to understand, and does not waste time. In this context,
(2018) BWM has been applied in areas such as site selection of tourism com­
Abadi et al. Medical tourism BWM Iran plexes, investments in coastal areas, health tourism, airport selection,
(2018)
Zolfani et al. Tourism industry- hotel BWM- WASPAS Iran
sports tourism, development of urban economy, determination of air
(2019) locating quality, geotourism, and textile industry. However, no study integrated
Kumar et al. Aviation industry (Green BWM- VIKOR India with BWM for ecotourism was detected. In this context, its absence in
(2020) and sustainable airports) ecotourism is felt strongly. Therefore, in this study, the BWM method,
Rahimi et al. Landfill site selection- GIS- BWM- group Iran
which is easier to apply and gives results in a short time compared to
(2020) Municipal solid waste fuzzy
management MULTIMOORA many MCDM methods, was preferred. Unlike other ecotourism studies,
Yang et al. Sports tourism Bayesian BWM- Taiwan in this study, SWOT analysis was integrated with BWM, which is one of
(2020) VIKOR the new multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) methods and used for
Torkayesh Healthcare sector BWM- LBWA- Eastern the first time in ecotourism. Also, for the sustainable development of
et al. (economic development CoCoSo Europe
(2021) and social sustainability) Countries
Masouleh, which has ecotourism potential, for the first time in this
Zhang et al. Economic development- Fuzzy BWM- CCD China study, quantitative-based ecotourism criteria and ecotourism strategies
(2021) Air quality model are listed in order of importance priorities. In this context, this meth­
Çiçekdağı Geotourism BWM- Fuzzy Turkey odology helped to rank systematically and scientifically the strategies
(2022) TOPSIS
needed to develop ecotourism. Thus, although the ecotourism potential
Ak et al. Occupational risk Bayesian BWM- Turkey
(2022) assessment- textile VIKOR has been determined, strategies have been proposed for the develop­
production industry ment of ecotourism in the village of Masouleh, where not only there is a
Yang et al. Medical tourism BWM- Grey Taiwan lack of tourism plan and investment; but also natural and cultural
(2022) PROMETHEE-AL landscape values are destroyed and there is conflict among institutions.
This study, in which an innovative method was used, is unique in terms
In their research, Yang et al. (2020) used Bayesian BWM and VIKOR of the quantitative ecotourism solutions it uses. It is expected that the
methods to identify potential sports tourism centers in Taiwan and integrated method and findings of this study will contribute to the
developed strategies for the sustainability of sports tourism. The re­ ecological and economic development of Masouleh, of which local
searchers stated that the MCDM methods used in the study provided identity and traditional structure are protected by UNESCO and natural
information to the decision-makers and gave effective results. The study and cultural landscape values have ecotourism potential. This study can
of Zhang et al. (2021) determined the criteria for the sustainable serve as an exemplary hybrid model for determining ecotourism criteria
development of the urban economy and the measurement of air quality. and formulating ecotourism strategies in the protected areas of Iran and
The importance weights of the criteria were determined by the fuzzy other developing countries.
BWM method. BWM based on pairwise comparisons of these criteria was
indicated to have higher consistency. On the other hand, Torkayesh 3. Study area
et al. (2021) implemented a new hybrid model for the evaluation of
health services. By using BWM and level-based weight assessment Iran is a vast land located in the Middle East with an area of 1.648
(LBWA) methods, health indicators were determined according to their million km2. The special geographical features of this country have
importance priorities and the health performances of the selected given Iran a four-season appearance (Motlagh et al., 2020). Masouleh
countries were evaluated. In her study, Çiçekdağı (2022) aimed to village, as the study area of this research, is located in Iran’s Gilan
determine the criteria for sinkholes to be tourism destinations. In this province, approximately 30 km west of Fuman and 60 km southwest of
context, the sinkholes criteria, which should be preferred with the Rasht (Isfahani, 2017). Masouleh is located near the southern coast of
highest priority for a tourism destination, were listed using BWM, and the Caspian Sea, in a valley surrounded by the Alborz Mountain range
the most suitable one was selected using the Fuzzy TOPSIS method. Ak (Motlagh et al., 2020) (Fig. 1). Masouleh village history dates back to
et al. (2022) used the Bayesian BWM and VIKOR models integrated by 1006 AD (Seyfi et al., 2019). In addition to natural resource values such
experts to prioritize the risks occurring during the textile production as high mountains and forests, there is also a cultural heritage site
phase. This method gives highly reliable results to practitioners and risk (Isfahani, 2017). While the population in Masouleh was around thirty
analysts. In their study, Yang et al. (2022) aimed to evaluate the per­ thousand until 1941, the population decreased to 554 according to the
formance of the health tourism sector by using integrated 2006 census due to migration events, the 1990 earthquake, lack of
Bayesian-BWM. The examination of these studies concluded that the employment, and land reform (Nasehi et al., 2017). According to the last
studies done with BWM were more understandable and gave results census conducted in 2016, the population of Masouleh has decreased to
faster than other MCDM methods. 393 people (SCI, 2016).
Masouleh with an area of 100 ha contains natural resources and
cultural heritage values is in Gilan’s traditional architecture and reflects
2.3. Research gap the sustainable architectural structure of Iran. Built on a steep hill, this
village has a unique sustainable architectural structure. With its high
Tables 1 and 2 provide effective and concise information on recent mountains and forests, the study area has high humidity and precipi­
research on ecotourism and other sustainable tourism, including BWM tation. This has affected the shape and orientation of the settlements
and other MCDM methods. Many MCDM methods such as AHP, ANP (Fig. 2). The settlements are oriented outwards to reduce the humidity
Fuzzy, Topsis, Electre, Cluster Analysis, Swara, Vikor, Dematel, and and make the most of the wind effect (Kakouei et al., 2012; Imani et al.,
Mabac have been used to rank ecotourism strategies according to their 2013; Hasanpour Luomer et al., 2014). Two or three-story buildings
importance priorities. It is possible to indicate that the accuracy rate of were built on a slope in harmony with the natural topography. There is
the research decreased due to the limited criteria and the increase in an organic settlement. The roof of each house, which is lined up in steps,
pairwise comparisons, and time was lost due to repeated surveys is used as the courtyard of an upper house. These roofs and houses also

4
E. Tajer and S. Demir
Fig. 1. Location map of the study area.
Fig. 2. Local architectural examples of the study area (Kakouei et al., 2012; Daneshgar et al., 2022).
serve as streets and serve the village as pedestrian areas. Thus, they are
compressed under the pressure of pedestrians and become more durable.
Motor vehicles are not allowed to enter. Local people used the natural
stones of the region, adobe and wood materials without damaging the
soil to preserve the water content in the soil, and built
environment-friendly structures. A kind of grey soil material called
“Foosh” is used as heat and moisture insulation material on the roofs
(Farnian, 2016).
The study area was included in Iran’s National Heritage List in 1975
due to its ecological and cultural landscape resources. In 2007, it became
a candidate for the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural
Organization (UNESCO) as Historic Heritage Site category. It has also
been registered as the country’s first living historical city in the list of
national monuments of Iran and has since been under the supervision of
the technical office of the National Union of Antiquities and Cultural
Heritage Organization (Nasehi et al., 2017; Seyfi et al., 2019). However,
there is no integrated management organization in the study area,
5
Journal of Cleaner Production 376 (2022) 134284
infrastructure and health services are insufficient. The study area, which
is one of the most touristic areas in the north of Iran, is visited by tens of
thousands of tourists every year. However, there is no tourism plan. In
Masouleh, other than tourism, the livelihood of the local people is
generally trade and livestock (Isfahani, 2017; Nasehi et al., 2017;
Daneshgar et al., 2022). Small handicrafts such as knitwear and wool
weaving, rugs and carpets made of cotton or wool called “jajim” and
traditional clothes are sold in the shops in the village bazaar. This bazaar
is an important element that forms the identity of the village (Kakouei
et al., 2012; Hasanpour Luomer et al., 2014; Farnian, 2016). However,
the handicrafts that have existed in Masouleh since the 1960s are in
danger of disappearing. The municipality, the cultural heritage organi­
zation, and certain non-governmental organizations have an impact on
the study area.
E. Tajer and S. Demir
4. Material and method
4.1. Material
The study area was used as the main material in this research and the
ecological and cultural landscape resources and protection value of the
study area. In this context, the existing literature on the study area, the
data of official institutions’ websites, and national and international
scientific projects and publications were examined. In addition, photo­
graphs and video recordings taken from the fieldwork and a survey
conducted with local people and experts were used. The following four
main materials were utilized in this study: (1) natural structure and
location of the study area, which were used to determine ecotourism
criteria, consisting of rivers, waterfalls, fauna and flora, forest, endemic
species, hills, plateaus, and caves. (2) physical structure consisting of
technical infrastructure, local architecture, and local structural mate­
rials. (3) economic and socio-cultural structure consisting of economic
diversity, population, caravansary, mosques, handicrafts, castle, hotel,
and museums. (4) administrative structure consisting of management,
organization, and regulations. Iran land cover/land use map 2017 data
was used to determine the land use of the area (Ghorbanian et al., 2020).
Moreover, scientific studies on the concepts of ecotourism, nature
tourism, rural tourism, alternative tourism, sustainable architecture,
and UNESCO-cultural heritage were examined.
4.2. Method
The research process consists of five stages: determination of the
current situation (1), the definition of ecotourism criteria (2), SWOT
analysis (3), quantification of ecotourism criteria with BWM (4), and
finally ecotourism strategies proposals (5) (Table 3).
4.2.1. Determination of the current situation
When determining the criteria required for the development of
ecotourism, it is very important to determine the natural structure,
physical structure, cultural structure, socio-economic structure, and
Table 3
Analytical steps of the methodology.
6
Journal of Cleaner Production 376 (2022) 134284
management structure of the region as well as environmental, cultural,
economic, and management problems. Iran land use/land cover map
2017 data was examined in the GIS environment to determine the
conservation value and ecotourism potential of Masouleh, which has
especially ecological and cultural landscape sensitivity. Accordingly,
“settlements, grasslands, croplands, bare lands, and recreational areas”
were determined as land uses. In the study, the studies on the archi­
tectural structure of Masouleh and its tourism potential were examined,
the current situation of the study area was analyzed by using the videos
and photographs taken during the fieldwork and online official public
institution data. In the first stage of the study, these helped to evaluate
the natural values of the study area and its cultural values, including its
historical-archaeological structure, within the scope of ecotourism po­
tential. As a result, considering these values, the ecotourism criteria of
the study area were determined in the following stages and the strengths
and opportunities that revealed its potential and the weaknesses and
threats that revealed its risks were listed.
4.2.2. Definition of ecotourism criteria
In this second stage, international meetings and conventions held in
the world within the scope of ecotourism were taken into account.
Ecotourism definitions and ecotourism requirements in their final re­
ports were examined. Also, other ecotourism studies and projects that
are similar to this study were examined and the ecotourism criteria and
ecotourism characteristics of these scientific studies were determined.
Considering the ecological, rural, and local architectural structure of the
study area, the criteria of nature tourism, alternative tourism, rural
tourism, and ecological tourism, which are sustainable tourism types
such as ecotourism, were also investigated (Masih et al., 2020; Neger,
2021; Sahani, 2021). As a result, 4 main criteria and 10 sub-criteria of
ecotourism were determined, taking into account the literature review
and the opinions of experts. The potentials and risks of each criterion
were evaluated in detail within the scope of SWOT analysis in the next
step. The main criteria were classified as natural structure and
geographical location, physical structure, economic and socio-cultural
structure, and management structure and sub-criteria were classified
E. Tajer and S. Demir
as location, ecological values, technical infrastructure, architectural
structure, economic diversity, social life, cultural values, historical and
archaeological values, administrative structure, and legislation. This list
of main and sub-criteria of ecotourism can serve as an exemplary draft
model for further ecotourism studies (Fig. 3).
4.2.3. SWOT analysis
SWOT analysis, which is a qualitative analysis technique, examines
the internal (strengths-weaknesses) and external (opportunities-threats)
factors of the study area (Yilmaz et al., 2009; Stamatiou et al., 2020;
Sahani, 2021). SWOT (Strengths-Weaknesses-Opportunities-Threats),
one of the widely used techniques to determine ecotourism strategies, is
an accepted analysis facilitating the decision-making process (Stamatiou
et al., 2020; Sahani, 2021). SWOT analysis has been widely imple­
mented in ecotourism planning in the last two decades (Nasehi et al.,
2017; Shang et al., 2020; Gerami and Hosseini, 2021). The purpose of
the SWOT analysis in this study is to identify Masouleh’s strengths and
weaknesses, as well as opportunities and threats, to determine its
ecotourism potential. The main and sub-ecotourism criteria determined
in the previous stage are classified under SWOT components (Table 4).
Subjective and quantitative SWOT analysis criteria are not objective and
numerical. However, numerical data is needed for the successful reali­
zation of the decision-making process. Therefore, SWOT analysis is
insufficient in the planning process (Yilmaz et al., 2009). Thus, within
the scope of this study, BWM was used in the next step to quantify the
SWOT factors and determine their priority of importance.
4.2.4. Setting priorities with the Best and Worst Method (BWM)
The fact that SWOT is subjective despite its ease is the most impor­
tant shortcoming of this analysis (Demir and Atanur, 2019; Popović
et al., 2021). However, objective data is needed for successful
decision-making (Yilmaz et al., 2009; Demir et al., 2016). To overcome
this inadequacy of SWOT, many researchers have preferred MCDM
methods (Demir et al., 2016; Ajmera, 2017; Ozdemir Işık and Demir,
2017; Popović et al., 2021). In ecotourism planning, SWOT analysis has
often been used together with the MCDM method in recent years, so the
results have been quantified according to their priorities (Demir et al.,
2016; Moharamnejad and Nourbakhsh, 2016; Demir and Atanur, 2019;
Asadpourian et al., 2020; Masih et al., 2020; Stamatiou et al., 2020;
Zorlu and Yilmaz, 2020; Sahani, 2021). Multi-criteria techniques pro­
vide transparency and auditability to the decision-making process
(Masih et al., 2020).
In this study, the Best and Worst Method (BWM), which is one of the
Fig. 3. The main and sub-ecotourism criteria of Masouleh.
7
Journal of Cleaner Production 376 (2022) 134284
Multiple-Criteria Decision-Making (MCDM) methods, was used to
determine the importance levels of SWOT components by quantifying
them. In this study, the BWM method, which has a high confidence in­
terval, is easier to apply, gives faster results, and is more effective and
realistic compared to many MCDM methods, is integrated with SWOT
analysis because this hybrid approach takes into account not only the
strengths and weaknesses of the alternatives but also the opportunities
and threats of the alternatives, as in the cost-benefit analysis. Thus, with
this innovative approach, it is possible to find the opportunity to turn
weaknesses into strengths and threats into opportunities in the utiliza­
tion of resources. To determine the priorities of the SWOT main and sub-
factors obtained as a result of Masouleh’s SWOT analysis for the
ecotourism sector, a questionnaire consisting of a pairwise comparison
was conducted with experts and local people. To determine the number
of surveys to be conducted in the study area, the most recent census
conducted in Masouleh in 2016 was considered. According to this data,
the population of Masouleh was determined to be 393 people. According
to the 95% confidence interval, the sample size of the questionnaire was
determined as at least 195 people. Nevertheless, within the scope of this
research, a total of 227 online surveys were conducted between January
and October 2021, including local people (191) and experts (36).
Tourists were not included in the survey, as there was a tourism re­
striction in Iran due to the Covid-19 pandemic. The following formula
was used to determine the sample size (Ozdemir Işık and Demir, 2017;
Demir and Atanur, 2019):
N × P × Q × t2
n=
(n − 1) × d2
n = Sample size, N = Population size (393).
t = Table value (1.96), P = Percentage picking a choice (0.5).
Q = (1-P) Percentage unpicking a choice (0.5),
d = Error margin (0.05).
BWM, developed by Dr. Jafar Razaei, is a vector-based multiple-
criteria decision-making method. The method consists of five numerical
stages: determining the decision criteria (1), determining the best and
worst criteria (2), making a comparison between the best-selected cri­
terion and other good criteria (3), making a comparison between the
worst selected criterion and other bad criteria (4) and finally deter­
mining the most appropriate weight (5) (Rezaei, 2014; Rezaei, 2016;
Nawaz et al., 2018; Rezaei et al., 2018). BWM requires fewer compari­
son data than other MCDM methods. Thus, it leads to more consistent
comparisons and provides more reliable results. BWM is a simple
E. Tajer and S. Demir Journal of Cleaner Production 376 (2022) 134284

Table 4
Evaluation of main and sub-ecotourism criteria based on SWOT Analysis.
MAIN ECOTOURISM CRITERIA

SWOT ANALYSIS Natural Structure Physical Structure Economic and Socio- Management SUB-CRITERIA OF
COMPONENTS and Geographical Cultural Structure Structure ECOTOURISM SUB-
Location CRITERIA OF
Strengths (S) S1: Presence of S3: Presence of local S5: Presence of historical ECOTOURISM
vegetation and products and local and archaeological
wildlife architecture structures and roads
S2: Being close to the S4: Use of energy-efficient S6: Continuation of
city center designs in buildings traditional culture and
tourism
Weaknesses W1: Destruction of W2: Lack of technical W4: Inadequate welfare W5: Insufficient
(W) vegetation infrastructure and health services investment in
W3: Existence of buildings tourism
that are not suitable for
local architecture
Opportunities O1: Having local
(O) accommodation
O2: Having job
opportunities
O3: Selling handicrafts
O4: Being on the UNESCO
tentative list
Threats(T) T1: Depopulation T3: Lack of
integrated urban
management
T2: Increasing crime rate T4: Lack of tourism
plan
T5: Uncontrolled
increase in land
prices

method that can be integrated with other MCDM methods and com­
parisons are made with integers ranging from 1 to 9 (Nawaz et al., 2018;
Rezaei et al., 2018; Nyimbili and Erden, 2021). All main and sub-criteria
of the participants of the study were compared with the BWM method
and were ranked according to their importance. The results of pairwise
comparisons with BWM were obtained with Solver Linear BWM soft­
ware. The consistency ratio is expected to be below 0.1 (Rezaei, 2014;
Liang et al., 2019; Nyimbili and Erden, 2021).
The basic steps of BWM can be summarized as follows (Rezaei, 2016;
Nawaz et al., 2018; Rezaei et al., 2018; Liang et al., 2019; Nyimbili and
Erden, 2021):
(1) Determination of decision criteria {c1 , c2 , ..., cn }
Based on the literature review, four factors were identified as the
main criteria of this study: Strengths (S), Weaknesses (W), Opportunities
(O), and Threats (T). Each main criterion consists of four to six sub-
criteria.
(2) Determination of best (B) and worst (W) criteria
At this stage, the participants are asked to identify which, in their
opinion, is the most important criterion to be considered and which is
the least important criterion.
most important criterion and 9 is much more important than the
most important criterion.
The resulting vector can be written as : AB = (aB1 , aB2 , ..., aBn ) (1)
(4). To determine the preference by pairwise comparison between the
worst (W) criterion and all worst criteria. Participants again give
each criterion a score from 1 to 9; whereby 1 is equally important
as the least important criterion and 9 is much more important
than the least important criterion.
The resulting vector can be written as : AW = (a1W , a2W , ..., anW )T (2)
(5). Find the optimal weights (w∗1 , w∗2 , ..., w∗n )
The optimal weight for the criteria is the one where, for each pair of
WB /Wj and Wj /WW , we have WB /Wj = aBj and Wj /WW = ajW . To satisfy
these conditions for all j, we should find a solution where the maximum
⃒ ⃒ ⃒ ⃒
⃒ B ⃒ ⃒ Wj ⃒
absolute differences ⃒WWj − aBj ⃒and ⃒WW − ajW ⃒for all j is minimized.
Based on the concept of minimizing the maximum deviation, this is
translated to the following constructed mathematical model to deter­
mine the optimal weights:

{⃒ / ⃒ ⃒ / ⃒}
minmax ⃒WB Wj − aBj ⃒and⃒Wj WW − ajW ⃒ , subject to, Sumj Wj = 1Wj ≥ 0, for all j (3)
j

(3). To determine the preference by pairwise comparison between the Conversion of the model in Eq. (3) to a linear programming form is as
best (B) criterion and all best criteria. They should give each presented below:
criterion a score from 1 to 9, whereby 1 is as important as the

8
E. Tajer and S. Demir Journal of Cleaner Production 376 (2022) 134284

⃒ ⃒
⃒ / ⃒ ⃒ Wj ⃒
min ξsubject to, ⃒WB Wj − aBj ⃒ ≤ ξ, for all j⃒⃒ − ajW ⃒⃒ ≤ ξ, for all j, Sumj Wj = 1, Wj ≥ 0, for all j. (4)
WW

Solving the linear programming problem in Eq. (4), the unique so­
lution of optimal weights (w1 , w2 , ..., wn )and ξ∗ is obtained. To check the
consistency of the BWM pairwise comparisons, the following formula is
applied:
ξ∗
consistencyratio =
consistency index
The consistency index uses maximum possible values of ξ∗ and can be
retrieved from (Table 5). A consistency ratio close to zero shows a high
consistency of the stakeholders. Observably, the smaller the value of ξ*,
the lower the consistency ratio and the more reliable the comparisons
and vice versa. The bigger the ξ*, the higher the consistency ratio
resulting in less reliable comparisons.
4.2.5. Suggestions of ecotourism strategies
The study aimed to propose appropriate and sustainable ecotourism
strategies for the healthy ecotourism development in the study area.
Therefore, at this stage, ecotourism criteria were ranked according to
their priorities, with a participatory approach involving experts and
local people, and strategies were determined for each criterion accord­
ing to their importance. In addition, recommendations have been
developed within the scope of the monitoring, control, and management
model.
5. Results
To determine the priorities of each criterion in the SWOT analysis of
Masouleh’s ecotourism potential, a total of 227 people, local people, and
experts were surveyed. According to the results of this survey, all com­
ponents of the SWOT analysis were ranked numerically based on their
priorities with BWM. According to the result, the strengths (0.435),
“Opportunities” (0.254), “Threats” (0.179), and “Weaknesses” (0.132)
were listed in order, from very high to very low, to determine the degree
(5) of importance for ecotourism (Table 6). This shows that the strengths of
the study area should be considered as a priority in the ecotourism
development in Masouleh and the formulation of ecotourism strategies.
Weaknesses of the study area, on the other hand, were chosen as the
least important component.
Among the “Strengths” in the SWOT group, “presence of vegetation
and wildlife” (0.103) was determined as the most prominent ecotourism
criterion, while “being close to the city center” (0.043) was the least
important one. Further, among the “Weaknesses”, which is one of the
main components of SWOT, “destruction of vegetation” (0.042) was the
most prominent criterion, while “lack of technical infrastructure”
(0.015) was the least important one. Among the “opportunities” in the
SWOT group, “being on the UNESCO tentative list” (0.095) was the most
prominent criterion, whereas “having local accommodation” (0.026)
was found to be the least important opportunity. Among the "threats”, as
one of the main components of SWOT, “increase in the crime rate”
(0.053) was the most prominent criterion, and “uncontrolled increase in
land prices” (0.013) was the least damaging threat.
Regarding ecotourism, strengths have been identified as the priority
and opportunities as the second priority component. These components
are included under the main ecotourism criteria “Natural structure and
geographical location” and “Economic and socio-cultural structure”.
Even though these components differ in terms of internal and external

Table 5
Consistency index table.
aBW 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

Consistency index 0.00 0.44 1.00 1.63 2.30 3.00 3.73 4.47 5.23

Table 6
The priority ranking results of all ecotourism criteria with integrated SWOT and BWM.
SWOT Priority values of Sub-Criteria of Ecotourism Priority Values of Ecotourism Sub- Priority
SWOT Criteria rankings

Strengths (S) 0.435 S1: Presence of vegetation and wildlife 0.103 1

S2: Being close to the city center 0.043 10
S3: Presence of local products and local 0.083 4
S4: Use of energy-efficient designs in buildings 0.044 9
S5: Presence of historical and archaeological structures and roads 0.089 3
S6: Continuation of traditional culture and tourism 0.070 6
Weaknesses (W) 0.132 W1: Destruction of vegetation 0.042 11
W2: Lack of technical infrastructure 0.015 19
W3: Existence of buildings that are not suitable for local 0.024 17
architecture
W4: Inadequate welfare and health services 0.022 18
W5: Insufficient investment in tourism 0.025 16
Opportunities .254 O1: Having local accommodation 0.026 15
(O) O2: Having job opportunities 0.052 8
O3: Selling handicrafts 0.079 5
O4: Being on the UNESCO tentative list 0.095 2
Threats (T) 0.179 T1: Depopulation 0.039 13
T2: Increasing crime rate 0.053 7
T3: Lack of integrated urban management 0.030 14
T4: Lack of tourism plan 0.041 12
T5: Uncontrolled increase in land prices 0.013 20

9
E. Tajer and S. Demir
Fig. 4. The priorities of the ecotourism strategies.
factors of the study area, they reveal the positive values of the study
area. Weaknesses and threats, which reflect the negative values of the
study area and therefore may negatively affect ecotourism, were
included under the main criteria of “physical structure” and “manage­
ment structure”, which were chosen as the least priority.
An evaluation of the SWOT analysis reveals that the “presence of
vegetation and wildlife” (0.103), which is a strong aspect among all
criteria of ecotourism, was the most important criterion. This result in­
dicates that the existence of fauna and flora in the study area is very
important within the scope of the development of ecotourism and
therefore it should focus on the protection of these natural landscape
assets. On the contrary, the criterion of “Uncontrolled increase in land
prices” (0.013), which poses a significant threat to the study area, was
chosen as the least important criterion among all ecotourism criteria.
This result shows that the uncontrolled price increase will harm
ecotourism investments. Also, the increase in land demand with price
increases and the rising in construction may put pressure on the sensitive
wildlife, vegetation, and cultural landscape resources of the study area.
The increase of these impermeable surfaces destroys the landscape
character of the study area. Masouleh being on the UNESCO tentative
heritage list was chosen as the second priority ecotourism criterion as an
opportunity. A sharp decrease is observed in the next ranking (Fig. 4).
This shows that it is important to raise awareness of Masouleh’s natural
and cultural-historical structure in terms of protecting these values and
serving ecotourism. According to the BWM results, 3 strengths (S1, S5,
S3) and 2 opportunities (O4, O3) criteria of the study area were selected
as the top five priority ecotourism criteria. This result emphasizes the
priority evaluation of the strengths that provide resources for
ecotourism and the opportunities created by these resources. These
criteria should be given priority in the proposal of ecotourism strategies
for this purpose. This indicates that for the ecotourism development in
Masouleh, the habitat feature, historical heritage, archaeological and
architectural structure, local products, handicrafts, traditional lifestyle,
and the existence of protection status should be taken into consideration
as the priorities. In the last five, there are 4 weaknesses and 1 threat
criteria. Among these components, “Destruction of vegetation (W1)”,
and “Insufficient investment in tourism (W5)” were determined as the
highest priority criteria. This shows that the weaknesses of the study
area are of the least importance in determining the strategies necessary
for the development of ecotourism. In this context, it is very important to
make plan decisions for the development of ecotourism, which trans­
forms weaknesses into strengths and threats into opportunities. The
study has an acceptable accuracy of 0.05.
6. Discussion
The present study tried to determine the ecotourism criteria neces­
sary for the development of ecotourism in Masouleh, protected by
UNESCO, and also pinpoint the appropriate strategies by SWOT
10
Journal of Cleaner Production 376 (2022) 134284
analysis. The point, however, is that this subjective and verbal analysis is
insufficient for determining ecotourism strategies in Masouleh. For this
reason, verbal SWOT analysis has been quantified through a new MCDM
method, BWM. Thus, all ecotourism criteria were objectively ranked
according to their priorities, and suggestions were listed within the
scope of ecotourism strategies. This integrated method, implemented
with a participatory approach (locals and experts), has been applied for
the first time in all scientific studies and projects carried out in Masouleh
and other ecotourism destinations. The following section includes
theoretical contributions and practical implications.
6.1. Theoretical contributions
In the related literature on ecotourism, it is possible to find a few
ecotourism studies in which quantified SWOT analysis has been applied
in areas that are important in terms of natural, geographical, socio-
cultural, historical structures, and protection values. Most of these
studies took place in national parks, other nationally and internationally
protected areas, rural areas, forests, and sea coasts. In this context, in
studies by Ajmera et al. (2015 and 2017); Pourebrahim and Amoushahi
(2017); Stamatiou et al. (2017, 2020); Milošević et al., 2018; Zorlu and
Yilmaz (2020); Hosseini et al. (2021a); Neger (2021); Popović et al.
(2018, 2021); Buyukozkan et al., (2021); Lee et al. (2021); Sahani
(2021), SWOT analysis was quantified with AHP, ANP Fuzzy, Topsis,
Electre, Cluster Analysis, Swara, Vikor, Dematel and Mabac. Researchers
have stated that as the number of criteria increased, the pairwise com­
parison questions increased, time was wasted, and the sensitivity of the
study decreased (Demir et al., 2016; Ozdemir I and Demir, 2017; Demir
and Atanur, 2019; Asadpourian et al., 2020) However, in this study,
unlike other studies, BWM was used, which has fewer comparison
questions in the questionnaire and therefore higher accuracy rate and
sensitivity than other MCDM methods. Reviewing the literature on BWM
shows that a wide range of studies have recently been conducted with
other MCDM methods (Fuzzy, Topsis, Vikor, Promethee, Multimoora,
Waspas, Cocoso) in fields such as health tourism, sports tourism, geo­
tourism, textile industry, development of the economy, increasing air
quality, site selection of tourism areas and airports (Askarifar et al.,
2018; Abadi et al., 2018; Zolfani et al., 2019; Kumar et al., 2020; Rahimi
et al., 2020; Yang et al., 2020, 2022; Torkayesh et al., 2021; Zhang et al.,
2021; Cicekdagi, 2022; Ak et al., 2022). However, no study was found in
the field of ecotourism in which SWOT analysis has been integrated with
BWM and digitized. In this study, a hybrid methodology was used to
determine the criteria and strategies necessary for the development of
ecotourism in internationally protected areas. In this context, each cri­
terion was listed under the main and sub-ecotourism criteria of
Masouleh, which has unique and specific landscape values, and each
criterion was ranked according to its priorities by comparing it with
BWM. This method, which quantifies the SWOT analysis, is an innova­
tive method used for the first time in the field of ecotourism, local ar­
chitecture and landscape architecture.
In the studies of Kakouei et al. (2012), Hasanpour Luomer et al.
(2014); Farnian (2016); Nasehi et al. (2017), and Isfahani (2017), Shang
et al. (2020) examined the architectural structure of Masouleh and
included rural tourism studies evaluated with SWOT analysis, which is a
subjective method. However, in these studies, Masouleh’s unique
vegetation, cultural structure, traditional lifestyle, and historical heri­
tage values were ignored. On the contrary, in this study, all ecological
and cultural landscape resources and conservation values that create
ecotourism potential for Masouleh were taken into account and these
values were listed under natural structure and geographical location,
physical structure, economic and socio-cultural structure, and manage­
ment structure. Sub-ecotourism criteria were determined under these
four main ecotourism criteria by SWOT analysis. Both main and
sub-ecotourism criteria were prioritized separately by comparing them
with BWM. Thus, for the first time, suggestions for ecotourism strategies
for ecotourism development in Masouleh are listed. Thus, this method,
E. Tajer and S. Demir
which supports the participatory approach, makes it possible to develop
appropriate ecotourism strategies especially for culturally and ecologi­
cally sensitive landscapes that still preserve their local texture.
In their studies, Demir et al. (2016), Ozdemir I and Demir (2017),
Demir and Atanur (2019), Asadpourian et al. (2020), Zorlu and Yilmaz,
2020; Sahani (2021) emphasized that the pairwise comparison methods
they used in their 2021 research increased the number of questions in
their questionnaires. In particular, Hosseini et al. (2021a) stated in their
study that by grouping ecotourism criteria with cluster analysis, they
reduced the pairwise comparison questions and increased the accuracy
rate. Similarly, unlike other pairwise comparison methods, the BWM
used in this study reduces the questionnaire questions considerably, so
there is no need to reduce the questions and/or group them with
different methods. Thus, the error resulting from the questionnaire was
reduced and the consistency ratio was increased. The results of the
survey study conducted with BWM have an acceptable consistency
(0.05), which is below the value of 0.1.
6.2. Practical implications
Masouleh, which has natural and cultural landscape values, has a
unique local architectural structure and a traditional lifestyle that still
continues. For this reason, it has been taken under preservation by
UNESCO and the Iranian Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance.
Areas with national and international conservation value are one of the
most important criteria that increase the ecotourism potential (Yilmaz
et al., 2009; Demir et al., 2016; Demir and Atanur, 2019; Zorlu and
Yilmaz, 2020). Within the scope of this study, the ecotourism strategies
proposed for the development of ecotourism in Masouleh will ensure the
protection of natural and cultural landscape values and the continuity of
the resources protected by UNESCO because ecotourism is nature-based,
respectful to nature, sustainable, and responsible kind of tourism that
protects ecological and cultural integrity. To ensure this integrity, it is
necessary to limit the number of visitors, establish visitor management,
calculate the carrying capacity, increase awareness and socio-economic
welfare of the region.
Masouleh’s components of its strengths, weaknesses, opportunities,
and threats have been associated with the natural structure and
geographical location, physical structure, economic and socio-cultural
structure, and management structure of the study area. In this context,
it is necessary to develop ecotourism strategies that take into account
Masouleh’s strong criteria and opportunities and minimize its weak
criteria and threats. As a result of the research, S1, Q4, and S3 were
selected respectively as the first three ecotourism criteria with the
highest priority. Therefore, considering these three criteria as a priority
can ensure the preservation of Masouleh’s specific characteristics, in­
crease its recognizability, and increase the employment, social and
economic welfare of the local people. Also in this survey, the compo­
nents of threats and weakness were selected as the least priority
ecotourism criteria. According to this result, the criteria of W4, W2, and
T5, which are under the physical structure and management structure,
should be taken into account. Considering these low, but negative,
criteria within the scope of ecotourism planning can increase health
services and employment, establish a healthy technical infrastructure,
and prevent the uncontrolled increase in land prices. At the same time,
these values have national and international protection status. Weak­
nesses and threats may hurt Masouleh’s ecological and cultural integrity
and therefore its conservation status. Thus, it is also beneficial to
develop ecotourism strategies that can turn the threats of the study area
into opportunities and the weaknesses into strengths. In this context, a
multi-disciplinary method organization can be established and a moni­
toring model can be created with the short-medium-long-term area and
visitor management. In this direction, it is necessary to establish an
interdisciplinary management organization with relevant ministries,
local administrations, tour organizations, ecotourism experts, univer­
sities, and stakeholders and determine the necessary monitoring criteria
11
Journal of Cleaner Production 376 (2022) 134284
(alternative sentence: For this purpose, it would be beneficial to estab­
lish an interdisciplinary management organization with relevant min­
istries, local governments, tour organizations, ecotourism experts,
universities, and stakeholders and to determine the necessary moni­
toring criteria).
According to the top five priority ecotourism criteria of BWM results
(S1, S5, S3, O4, O3), first of all, the physical structure and economic and
socio-cultural structure of the research area, which are among the main
ecotourism criteria, should be improved. Besides, necessary conserva­
tion strategies must be initiated quickly for Masouleh, which is on the
UNESCO temporary list, to be included in the UNESCO permanent list.
Weak components are ranked as the lowest priority among ecotourism
criteria. According to this result, it is possible to recommend preparing
and protecting the vegetation inventory, raising the local people’s
awareness about the local vegetation, supporting the investments in
ecotourism, and providing sponsorship because the natural features and
geographical location of the study area and supporting the management
structure are important for the development of ecotourism in Masouleh.
Also, although Masouleh has a tourism potential with its geographical
location, vegetation, wildlife, local architecture, historical, and
archaeological structure, the lack of a tourism plan and the lack of in­
vestment in tourism are both weaknesses and threats in terms of man­
agement. Therefore, a healthy and interdisciplinary management
organization is also needed for sustainable tourism development. For
healthy ecotourism planning to take place in Masouleh, protection
measures supported by the participation of the relevant stakeholders can
be taken. Also, promoting the values protected by UNESCO to increase
Masouleh’s recognizability can be considered as a priority ecotourism
strategy in ensuring the development of ecotourism.
7. Conclusion
Tourism is one of the significant sectors that contribute to the eco­
nomic development of countries in today’s world. Minimizing the
pressure on natural and cultural resource values in the areas where
tourism takes place can be achieved merely with sustainable tourism
development. In this context, ecotourism is a sustainable type of tourism
that both minimizes the pressure on ecological and cultural resources
and contributes to the socio-economic development of the local people
in the balance of protection-utilization. Therefore, ecotourism plays a
significant role in the sustainable development of a region. The under­
lying purpose of this study, carried out within the scope of ecotourism, is
to determine Masouleh’s ecotourism criteria and accordingly propose
priority ecotourism strategies for the development of ecotourism in Iran.
In this context, criteria suitable for the research area were determined by
taking into account the ecotourism criteria in the world. After that, a
new MCDM method, BWM, was used for the first time with the partic­
ipation of local people and experts, and a survey was conducted for the
first time in which SWOT analysis was integrated with this method. With
this integrated method, SWOT Analysis, which reveals the positive and
negative aspects of the study area and has a subjective nature, was
quantified with BWM, which is a pairwise comparison method. Thus, the
research gained an objective feature.
Nationally and internationally protected areas have tourism poten­
tial with their natural, historical, and archaeological landscape values.
Therefore, supporting the development of sustainable tourism including
ecotourism in such areas can contribute to the management of these
resources in a protection-use balance and increase the socio-economic
welfare of the local people. Among all ecotourism criteria for Masou­
leh, strengths, opportunities, threats, and weaknesses are listed in order
of importance. This result shows that ecotourism planning proposals for
strengths and opportunities should be developed as a priority in
ensuring ecotourism development in Masouleh. In this context, it is
necessary to primarily focus on the ecotourism criteria titled “presence
of vegetation and wildlife (S1)”, “being on the UNESCO tentative list
(O4)”, and “presence of historical and archaeological structure (S5)”
E. Tajer and S. Demir
respectively. Moreover, this result shows that the issues related to the
weaknesses, which are not considered much by the participants, should
be taken into account at least.
Some limitations might be ascribed to this study. For example, most
of the survey studies conducted during the Covid-19 pandemic, which is
a major epidemic in the world, were carried out online only with the
local people and experts working on ecotourism and Masouleh due to
the restriction of transportation and tourism to Iran. For this reason,
tourists were not included in the survey study. Additionally, although
Masouleh has been determined to have tourism potential with its natural
landscape values and cultural landscape values protected by UNESCO,
there is no tourism development plan, tourism investments, or tourism
management organization in the region yet. Further, the survey study
with BWM requires an explanation to the participants. In this context,
some questionnaires were repeated due to the low accuracy rate (above
0.1). To find solutions to all these limitations, firstly, a holistic
ecotourism planning process that develops ecotourism strategies within
the framework of legal regulations is required to achieve ecotourism
goals in Masouleh. It is, then, necessary to establish an interdisciplinary
management organization in cooperation with the local institution,
relevant ministries, experts, and stakeholders and determine the
necessary monitoring criteria. The inclusion of tourists, who are one of
the most important stakeholders of ecotourism, in the survey study in
future research may contribute to the increase in the number of par­
ticipants and thus the increase in the acceptability of the research. In
future BWM studies, explaining the surveys by face-to-face or online
presentation and sharing the solution of a sample question with the
participants beforehand will both reduce the loss of time and increase
the accuracy rate. Also, it would be beneficial to support survey studies
with social media, workshops, video calls, and presentations in future
research. Consequently, the results and methodology, which is used for
the first time within the scope of ecotourism, can set an example model
for ecotourism research developed not only in Iran but also in other
developing countries’ protected areas with ecotourism potential. That is,
for further studies, this integrated and innovative method based on a
participatory approach, which was used within the scope of this research
and can guide future ecotourism studies and landscape studies, will
contribute to the objective realization of other ecotourism strategies and
landscape planning strategies to be carried out in ecologically and
culturally sensitive areas with its local architecture.
CRediT authorship contribution statement
Elnaz Tajer: Conceptualization, Data curation, Formal analysis,
Investigation, Methodology, Resources, Software, Visualization, Writing
– original draft. Sara Demir: Conceptualization, Investigation, Meth­
odology, Resources, Supervision, Validation, Visualization, Writing –
original draft, Writing – review & editing.
Declaration of competing interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial
interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence
the work reported in this paper.
Data availability
Data will be made available on request.
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