The objective of this study is to prepare a strategy to link tourism, local environment and waste generation and highlight policy instruments for effective waste management in the states in the Indian Himalayan Region (IHR). To quantify the impact of rising tourist footfalls on the state economy, a regional input-output (IO) table is being created, focusing on the tourism sector, that will be used as a base to construct a social accounting matrix (SAM) for the state of Uttarakhand. The bi-directionality between the amount of municipal solid waste generated and tourist footfalls in the state is explored by the development of a Computable General Equilibrium (CGE) model on the generated IO table. The study uses secondary research and primary data collection as part of its methodology to estimate state-level CGE parameters. Once all the parameters of the model are estimated, various policy instruments will be tested to analyse their efficacy in managing solid waste generated in the region and understand their possible effects on other economic parameters such as tourism revenue and employment.
