THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE PRINCIPLES OF SUSTAINABLE TOURISM IN THE BALATON REGION

When we speak about sustainability there is a sector of industry that deserves attention because of its increasing economic weight in the past decades, the rising number of stakeholders and the widening circle of service providers. This sector is the tourism industry, which has an impact not only on the economy of the visited country but also on the social, cultural and environmental relations, so if we speak about sustainability, we can not ignore its role and effect. Tourism has become so a part of sustainable development, which can be conduced through the application of the Tourism Destination Management (TDM) all over the world (Ritchie, Crouch, 2003, p. 45). What do we actually mean by the sustainability of tourism? What methodology and what kind of tools are available to transfer them into parctice? How does it operate in one of the most important holiday regions in Hungary, in the Balaton region that is the region of the largest sweet water lake in Central Europe at the same time? In this study the authors are trying to find answers for these questions by introducing the first steps of the Balaton region and the environment protection practice in one of the settlements and the micro-regional efforts of a local nature protection civil organization for the sake of sustainability.