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While Protected Area based Tourism (PAT) has become a global phenomenon, its social, economic and environmental implications are also widening. Almost half of the entire tourists coming to Nepal visit protected areas (PAs). The country has embraced this as an opportunity for conservation, poverty reduction and economic development. However, only limited groups, often outsiders or elites, are reported to reap benefits of PAT whilst poor and marginalized groups struggle for both rights and benefits. Further, the distribution of tourist as well as the revenue generated is not even across different PAs. Policy and legal ambience are partly muddled with numerous approaches for resource management. However, recent ‘paradigm shift’ in the management and governance of PAs offers optimism to address social, economic and environmental anomalies. In the pretext of limited rigorous site specific studies and complexities to measure trade-offs between problems and gains, this article stresses on transformation in PA governance so as to realize full and equitable sharing of benefits from PAT.

This is an open access article under the terms of the Creat ive Commo ns Attri bution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

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Mammals have experienced a massive decline in their populations and geographic ranges worldwide. The sloth bear, Melursus ursinus (Shaw, 1791), is one of many species facing conservation threats. Despite being endangered in Nepal, decades of inattention to the situation have hindered their conservation and management. We assessed the distribution and patterns of habitat use by sloth bears in Chitwan National Park (CNP), Nepal. We conducted sign surveys from March to June, 2020, in 4 × 4 km grids (n = 45). We collected detection/non‐detection data along a 4‐km trail that was divided into 20 continuous segments of 200 m each. We obtained environmental, ecological, and anthropogenic covariates to understand determinants of sloth bear habitat occupancy. The data were analyzed using the single‐species single‐season occupancy method, with a spatially correlated detection. Using repeated observations, these models accounted for the imperfect detectability of the species to provide robust estimates of habitat occupancy. The model‐averaged occupancy estimate for the sloth bear was 69% and the detection probability was 0.25. The probability of habitat occupancy by sloth bears increased with the presence of termites and fruits and in rugged, dry, open, undisturbed habitats. Our results indicate that the sloth bear is elusive, functionally unique, and widespread in CNP. Future conservation interventions and action plans aimed at sloth bear management must adequately consider their habitat requirements.