Coupling Coordination Relationship between Tourism Industry and Ecological Civilization: A Case Study of Guangdong Province in China

Ecological civilization has a significant role in the sustainable development of the regional tourism industry. The high dependence of tourism on ecological civilization contributes to the complex interaction between the two. How to coordinate the relationship between tourism and ecological civilization has affected the sustainable development and ecological civilization strategy of Guangdong Province and even the whole of China. Previous quantitative research on the coupling and coordination of the two has certain limitations. One limitation is the lack of dynamic prediction. In this paper, an evaluation index system of the relationship between tourism and ecological civilization is constructed. Quantitative methodologies such as entropy-weight, gray relation analysis, and obstacle degree are integrated. Meanwhile, the gray model (GM), GM (1,1) model is used for prediction. The data sample is based on the years 2005 to 2021 in Guangdong Province, China. The main results are as follows: (1) Tourism and ecological civilization both rise slowly from a low starting point. Affected by the epidemic, tourism declines rapidly in 2020 and rises slowly in 2021, but it still lags behind ecological civilization. Both continue a slow upward trend over the next decade. (2) The degree of coupling coordination has undergone a fluctuating evolution from moderate disorder to mild coordination and falls back to the barely coordination stage from 2020 to 2021. In the next decade, the coupling coordination between the two will be gradually optimized. The coupling coordination degree will be greater than 0.8 having entered a benign coordination stage in 2028; (3) The gray relation and obstacle factors show different dynamics. High gray relation comes from the ecological civilization. Partial factors are still in the region with high gray relation and high obstacle degree. The results of this paper are expected to contribute to a more appropriate ecotourism model and provide some enlightenment for implementing the effectively coordinated sustainable development of tourism and ecological civilization in Guangdong Province, China, as well as those areas with the same industrial characteristics.