LA PERCEPCIÓN SOCIAL EN DESTINOS DE SOL Y PLAYA. CASO DE “CHIPIPE”, SANTA ELENA.

Abstract

Sun and beach tourism represents an important segment for the national tourism, but it is also a product that by its characteristics of massiveness entails a lot of impacts. To counteract them, the Ecuadorian government following international guidelines proposes the creation of the technical standard NTE INEN 2631: 2012 and its subsequent accreditation under the blue destination certification. Despite this, there is no certified beach, nor is the user's perception of these coastal spaces known. In response to this, the present study analyzes the perception of Chipipe’s users as much on the importance they give to the parameters of the norms for the tourist implementation as to its own valuation of the beach. This was done through a descriptive study through a questionnaire formulated to a sample of 196 users. Finally, through a comparative analysis of the attributes' valuation between the importance of the criteria’s standards in a beach and the perception of Chipipe, the hypothesis could be verified, evidencing the existence of an unfavorable difference between the perception of the user and the importance that they gave to the attributes of the certification.