Determining the criteria affecting the ecotourism destinations with analytical hierarchy process management: a research on the city of Giresun

Today, the tourism industry changes in the holiday understanding of tourists as a result of national and international events. With the "Covid-19" epidemic in the world today, ecotourism, which is a type of tourism that integrates with nature in small groups without harming the nature, has become more preferred. In this context, in order to attract the attention of tourists with the unique opportunities offered by ecotourism destinations, marketing and promotional activities carried out by travel agencies should be improved. Giresun province is an important ecotourism destination in terms of its geographical features, plateaus, ecovillages and ecological diversity. The aim of this study is; To reveal which criteria or criteria are effective as a result of the selection of the managers of travel agencies in Giresun regarding the understanding of ecotourism using the "Analytical Hierarchy Process" (AHS) method. Within the scope of the study, first of all, the literature on the subject was searched and the questionnaire method was used as a data collection tool. In line with the data obtained from the survey data server, the frequency analysis showing the demographic status of the travel agency managers was first performed with the SPSS25 program, and then a binary comparison matrix of the criteria previously specified in the Analytical Hierarchy Method (AHS) was created. Then the geometric means were calculated. Super decision V 3.2 program was used to analyze the data. As a result of the analysis, it was seen that the safety criterion was the most important selection criterion for the ecotourism understanding of travel agency managers. The importance levels of other selection criteria for the ecotourism understanding of travel agency managers are determined as tourism facilities, natural life, cultural structure, transportation, geographical features, infrastructure, climate and price, respectively. In addition, in the study, suggestions are made for criteria that will contribute to the development of ecotourism activities in Giresun.