Assessment of wildlife tourism potential in Gunung Stong State Park.

The present study was used to identify potential attributes of Gunung Stong State Park
(GSSP) to become a suitable place for wildlife tourism implementation as GSSP is
honored with regular backwoods living spaces and rich with flora and faunas, amongst
its attraction is natural wilderness. The objective of this study is to identify the flagship
species of wildlife tourism and to determine the tourist’s perception and expectations
towards implementing wildlife tourism in the study area. List of potential flagship
wildlife species were collected from Gunung Stong management plan and linked with
the current IUCN status to show that this species have tendency to play their role as a
flagship species. Next a convenience sampling and a planned questionnaire was applied
in this study to evaluate the possibilities of wildlife tourism implementation interest.
Besides, direct observations of the activities were carried out to recognize the existing
activities in GSSP which able to support wildlife tourism. This study attempts to identify
12 flagship species which two were birds and the remaining 10 were mammals as the
key potential for wildlife tourism. Based on tourists demographic profile obtained
through survey instrument, majority of the tourists were Malaysian and only an 11%
were foreign tourists and the analysis showed positive distribution of tourists perception
in supporting wildlife tourism implementation, majority indicated that they do support
for the introduction of wildlife tourism in Gunung Stong State Park, even their purpose
for visiting Gunung Stong State Park is for adventure activities and not specifically to
see wildlife. From direct observation two activities were observed which were hiking
and events organized by Gunung Stong State Park authorities which participated by
tourists. Based on this identification recommendations have been suggested to enable the
wildlife tourism setting to be implemented. This may result an increase in tourists arrival
at Gunung Stong State Park and ultimately improvise the socio-economic development
of the state.