Archive:Tourism and sustainable development

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Are recent evolutions in tourism compatible with sustainable development?

This article takes a look at some recent evolutions in tourism behaviour and preferences that can have an impact on the sustainability of tourism.

Main statistical findings

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Highlights

In the period 1998-2005, the number of short holiday trips has grown by 47%, compared to 31% for the total number of holiday trips (see Table 1). In 2005, 1 in 2 trips had a length of only 1 to 3 nights.

Over the same period, the number of long holiday trips (i.e. trips with stays of 4 nights or more) by airplane has grown by 33%. In 2005, air travel was used for 1 in 4 long holiday trips.

Potential tourist pressure goes hand in hand with employment possibilities: regions with a high tourism intensity tend to have lower unemployment rates.

Long trips

For long trips, holidaymakers have an increasing preference for outbound rather than domestic trips

Since the pressure of tourism on the environment (e.g. in terms of polluting emissions) will be related to the distance to the destination, it is interesting to see whether the behaviour of European tourists has changed in terms of a preference for domestic trips compared to trips abroad, or for trips within Europe compared to trips to other continents. On aggregate, we see in Figure 1 that the number of outbound holiday trips (or trips with a destination outside the Member State where the respondent lives) of 4 nights or more has increased by 23% over the period 1998-2005, compared to 18% for domestic holiday trips (data based on 14 Member States). In Table 2, the share of outbound trips in the total number of holiday trips of four nights or more is given for the past ten years. For many countries, an increasing preference for outbound trips, as compared to domestic trips, can be observed, with the fastest growth in the market share of outbound trips being noted in Estonia and Greece. The first column in Table 2 shows that, on aggregate, more than 2 out of 5 holidays are spent outside the holidaymaker's own country. The preference for outbound holidays, as compared to holidays in the own Member State, varies considerably from one country to another. The differences can partly be linked to geographical location, for instance in many of the Mediterranean countries, less than 1 in 5 trips go to other countries.

In the context of sustainability and the possible effects of tourism on the environment, trips outside Europe may have a stronger impact on the environment since longhaul flights often become indispensable for reaching the destination. On the other hand, for many countries the arrival of European tourists is very important for their economy and the development of their country. Table 3 shows that among the (long) trips that have a destination outside the respondent's own Member States, only a few holidays are spent in Africa, Asia, America or Oceania. For most countries, the share of non-European holidays is less than 20%. Although the picture is incomplete due to missing data for some Member States, this share seems to have stayed relatively stable over the past decade.

Short holidays

Short holidays are the fastest growing segment of the tourism market

Over recent years, the number of holiday trips has been increasing (see Table 1 and Figure 2). This increase is much greater for short trips. Indeed, while the number of trips (regardless of the length of stay) has increased by about 31% between 1998 and 2005, the number of short trips (1 to 3 overnight stays) has increased by 47% over the same period. As a consequence, the share of short trips in the total number of holiday trips has increased from 44% to 50%. Behind these aggregate results based on 11 Member States, this share differs strongly from one country to another and from one year to another (see Table 4). It is equally important to have a look at the changes in behaviour as regards the destination of short holiday trips. More than 9 out of 10 short holidays are spent within the respondent's country, but since short trips abroad can weigh relatively more upon the environment, we also look at the evolution in this smaller segment of the market. Based on estimates for 11 Member States (see above), the number of domestic short trips has increased a little more than the number of short trips abroad, by 47% and 42% respectively. Within the total number of holiday trips, the share of short trips abroad has increased from 4.1% in 1998 to 4.4% in 2005. In Table 5, we can observe that this growth in the importance of short trips abroad is particularly high in Ireland and the UK, two Member States where residents may be making more use of better or cheaper connections to other countries.

long holiday trips by airplane

In less than a decade, the number of long holiday trips by airplane has grown by 33%

Figure 3 shows the relative share of the transport modes as principal means of transport used for long holiday trips (i.e. trips of at least four nights). When comparing 1998 with 2005, their relative shares have remained nearly stable, apart from air travel and private and hired vehicles. For the thirteen Member States where data was available for both reference years, private and hired vehicles (mostly cars) are the means of transport for almost 6 out of 10 holiday trips of 4 nights or more, although a decrease of their share by 2.7 percentage points can be observed. The use of trains as the principal means of transport for holidays remained – on aggregate - more or less stable in this group of thirteen Member States, at a level of slightly less than 8%. Air travel has witnessed the largest growth. In 1998, travel to the holiday destination by airplane represented 22.5% of all long holiday trips. By 2005, this share had increased to over 25.1% for the same group of Member States for which data was available.

Access to air transport can be seen as a driving force for tourism, in the sense that it allows tourists to travel a long way to other continents and to get in contact with different cultures all over the world. However, travel by airplane can also put pressure on the environment, as this mode of transport is often considered to be less environmental friendly than for instance railway transport. Table 6 on the next page shows that the importance of air travel for holiday trips differs widely across the European Union, ranging from 3% in Romania and 5% in Bulgaria to more than 70% in Ireland. In terms of growth, the largest increases over the last few years are noted for some of the Member States that joined the EU in 2004, especially in the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania where the percentage of holiday trips by airplane has doubled in the past three or four years. For the group of 13 Member States for which data is available over the period 1998-2005, Figure 4 shows that the number of holiday trips by plane has increased by more than 33% (compared to 20% for the total number of holiday trips). Considering that this group consists of former EU-15 Member States and that air travel is growing relatively fast in the new Member States, this growth will be even higher for the entire EU-27.

Unemployment rates in toursim intensity regions

Regions with highest tourism intensity tend to have lower unemployment rates

Often tourists to a country are centralised in a small number of places. This presence of tourists can have an impact on the quality of life of the local population in those areas or regions, especially during certain peak periods in the year. On the other hand, the inflow of tourists can be an important motor for a region's economy, including its labour market. This section takes a look at the regions with the highest intensity of tourists, i.e. the number of tourist bedplaces or the number of tourist nights in a region in comparison with its population. Table 7 shows the regions having the highest number of tourist nights, compared to their population. The listed regions have a tourism intensity of 20 or more tourist nights per inhabitant of the region. It should be kept in mind that this figure is an average over the year. Indeed, the number of tourist nights per inhabitant will be much higher in the peak seasons, especially in regions where the tourist season lasts only for 3 or 4 months. Although the presence of an important tourism sector will not be the only explanation, all but one of these regions have unemployment rates which are much lower than the average in the respective Member States. Only for the Canary Islands, does this not hold. When looking at the 30 regions (NUTS2 level) with the highest tourism intensity (in terms of tourist nights), only 6 have an unemployment rate exceeding the national rate.

As mentioned above, tourism is often a very local phenomenon, hence the importance of studying the level of tourism and its effects at a detailed regional level. While the previous paragraph looked at relatively large regions that can have a very heterogeneous tourism intensity within the region, Table 8 takes a look at the tourism intensity at a more detailed regional level (NUTS3 level). Since the number of nights spent is not available at this level, the indicator of tourism intensity used here refers to the number of bedplaces in tourist accommodation in comparison with the population of the region. In the table, the regions having more than 400 tourist bedplaces per inhabitant are listed. Again, we observe that in most of these regions, the unemployment rate is lower than the national unemployment rate. The two regions having significantly higher unemployment rates than the national figure, are special cases; Corsedu- Sud scores better than average for the island of Corse (but not in comparison to France as a whole), while Rügen is part of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, the Bundesland with the highest unemployment rate in Germany.

Data sources and availability

Context

In recent years, the tourism sector has been a fast growing economic activity in many countries. Tourism creates added value and employment in the receiving countries and can contribute to a better knowledge or image of a country. However, the question of whether tourism is developing in a sustainable way is posed more and more frequently. Transport of tourists can put pressure on the environment, while the presence of tourists can put pressure on the quality of living of local communities and the maintenance of their cultural and historical heritage in tourism destinations.

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