Sustainable Tourism Development in the Nordic Arctic
Arctic economies are broadening from resource extraction to tourism
The project aims to investigate how to use existing human capital, natural (living marine) resources and infrastructure capacity to develop innovative sustainable tourism that diversifies and increases resilience in Arctic communities. We explore tourism that encompasses marketing of location-branded goods, consumed on- or off-site.
The project brings academic experts in Arctic marine resource economics, tourism and marketing together with tourism practitioners whose livelihoods rely upon marine resources. This collaboration deepens the ability to understand relationships between resource use and degradation, the role of place, and the particulars of activity involving tourism operators, tourists, and competing uses of leisure time and income.
Challenges for sustainable Arctic tourism development include significant capacity constraints on labor and natural and physical capital, and strong seasonal effects that require flexibility for optimal investments. By exploring in-situ case studies of innovative local tourism and business, we seek to understand how best to foster sustainable tourism in the Arctic in order to increase social welfare for the inhabitants of the region and for the consumers of these tourism outputs.
With his comprehensive approach, the project can identify and compare prospects and challenges for Arctic regions to generate policy relevant actions to enhance sustainable tourism development, particularly for communities affected by structural changes in living marine resource industries.
The project is carried out in cooperation with Candadian, Norwegian, Swedish, Faroese and Islandic partners, and is financed by the The International Network Programme with an amount of DKK 285,000.
Contact persons are Project Manager and Associate Professor Chris Horbel and Professor mso Brooks Kaiser.