Tourism and the nature of Poland and its conservation

The areas being protected by law (regulation from 16.04.2004) due to the beauty of landscape and the unique features of nature are the main matters of tourists´ interest. On thee areas with the great number of tourists we can observe the phenomena of degradation of nature. In the article we discuss the forms of tourism, which wouldn’t be a threat to stability and functioning of protected ecosystems. As a form of the most environmentally friendly we consider ecotourism which – according to definition of D. Zaręba (2000) – is a concept of tourism associated with nature organized and managed in a sustainable way with elements of ecological education and financially supplying conservation of nature.