The Consideration of Climate Change at the Tourism Destination Level in Finland: Coordinated Collaboration or Talk about Weather?

Abstract

This article reports the findings of a case study focusing on the role of climate change at the tourism destination level development and planning in a Finnish context. While the emergence of climate change in tourism is becoming more evident in strategies and development papers, the considerations and concrete actions of tourism stakeholders seem to be on a less established level. Interviews among tourism stakeholders in two Finnish winter tourism destinations suggest that destination-level activity related to climate change is still in its infancy, reactive by nature and dependent on individuals' ambitions. Nevertheless, the general development targets for allyear and sustainable tourism support the efforts to cope with changing climate.

A critical review of climate change risk for ski tourism

“…Adaptation to climate variability (not future change) is predominantly incremental and reactive (short-term) rather than anticipatory and pro-active (long-term). As with the broader tourism sector Scott et al, 2016), there is limited evidence of long-term strategies to adapt to climate change, regardless of whether the competitiveness of a destination is expected to increase or decrease under climate change (Abegg et al, 2007;Scott et al, 2007;Tervo-Kankare, 2011).…”

Adapting to climate change: perceptions of vulnerability of down-hill ski area operators in Southern and Middle Finland

“…So far, winter tourism adaptation research has mainly dealt with findings from Alpine European (Bank & Wiesner, 2011;Bürki, Elsasser, & Abegg, 2003;Endler & Matzarakis, 2011), North American (Dawson & Scott, 2007;Dawson & Scott, 2013;Scott, McBoyle, & Minogue, 2007;Shih, Nicholls, & Holecek, 2009) and Australian (Bicknell & McManus, 2006;Pickering & Buckley, 2010) contexts. So far, less focus has been placed on northern latitudes (Brouder & Lundmark, 2011;Konu, Laukkanen, & Komppula, 2011;Tervo-Kankare, 2011) and on low-lying, small and medium-sized downhill skiing areas (Jopp, DeLacy, & Mair, 2010;Steiger & Mayer, 2008;Unbehaun, Pröbstl, & Haider, 2008).…”

Nordic Perspectives on Tourism and Climate Change Issues

“…While this makes the region attractive in global tourism markets, it also makes the regional tourism industry vulnerable to global climate change and its local outcomes (Brouder & Lundmark, 2011) as nature-based tourism activities in particular are seen as being sensitive to the predicted climate change impacts (see Saarinen & Tervo, 2006;Scott, 2006;Tervo-Kankare, 2011). Thus, major changes in the environment and/or the climate may pose direct or indirect threats -but also opportunities -for Nordic tourism.…”