Mangrove biodiversity as tourism attraction : the perspective of tourist_JBES

• Prastiyo*, Luchman Hakim, Jati Batoro

1. Departement Of Biology, Faculty Of Matemathics and Natural Sciences, Brawijaya University,
   Malang, East Java, Indonesia

Indonesia has at least 47 types of ecosystems, one of ecosystems that have a lot of potential in Indonesia is a mangrove forest. Mangrove forests in Indonesia have a high diversity of flora and fauna. Development and utilization of coastal areas around the mangrove forest, usually not done wisely that is likely to endanger the stability of the mangrove ecosystem in the long term.

One alternative utilization of mangrove forests that could be developed without damaging the environment is the development of ecotourism. Mangrove forest in Pancer Cengkrong Karanggandu is one of the mangrove forest areas with the potential to be developed into a tourist area of mangrove.

The purpose of this research is to study the potential and preferences of flora and fauna (birds) in the Cengkrong Mangrove Forest as a tourist attraction in the development ecotourism programs with community participation. Stakeholders involved in the study consisted of mangrove forest communities, students of nature lovers and a science teacher with a total of 135 people. Data analysis was performed with the help of Microsoft Excel and analyzed descriptively further showed form of graphs.

Result showed that Cengkrong mangrove forests has the potential to be used as ecotourism. Diversity of flora found in the mangrove forest is composed of 22 species with the highest RFC index is Brugueira gymnoriza. While the diversity of bird species found to consist of 21 species with the highest RFC index is Laptoptilus javanicus. 

FULL ARTICLE AVAILABLE AT: Volume 6, Number 2, February 2015 – JBES
PUBLISHED JOURNALS: Journal of Biodiversity and Environmental Sciences (JBES)