Machiel Lamers

The emergence of institutional innovations in tourism: the evolution of the African Wildlife Foundation's tourism conservation enterprises.

This paper examines the evolving and innovatory role of the African Wildlife Foundation (AWF), an NGO with charitable status, in dealing with the challenge of protecting wildlife outside state-protected areas. Drawing on the theoretical framework of institutional entrepreneurship, we historically trace AWFs engagement in conservation tourism, describing the complexities of how its actions evolved into the new organizational form of tourism conservation enterprises. We identify four key mechanisms – its “glocal” scope of action, awareness of policy and market voids, experimentation and hiring business professionals – that explain why AWF became aware, motivated and open to developing this organizational form. Lessons emerging from this process include that conservation NGOs should act as “opportunity seekers”, focus on incremental rather than radical innovations, note voids and ambiguities in governmental policies that provide opportunities for non-state actors to assume the role of institutional entrepreneur, and hire staff skilled in business, tourism and strategic management besides staff with the more conventional conservation skills in order to effectively engage in conservation tourism. Overall, the paper notes the importance of commercial conservation tourism approaches for the work of protected areas worldwide, and in using tourism as a poverty alleviation tool in less developed countries.

Estimating the Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Antarctic Tourism

Tourism in Antarctica is rapidly growing and diversifying, which raises concerns about its effects on the environment. Research and policy-making efforts have so far focused on the impacts on Antarcticas own ecosystems, whereas global impacts have all but been ignored. This article presents an inventory of greenhouse gas emissions produced by Antarctic tourism. Emissions are shown to be considerable, with aviation and cruises being the main sources. Tourism to the Antarctic ranks among the most energy-intensive segments in the tourism market. It is argued that greenhouse gas emissions should be included in environmental impact assessments. Improving the global environmental performance of Antarctic tourism is difficult, because of its exclusive dependency on long-haul trips.

Setting the Scene: Human Activities, Environmental Impacts and Governance Arrangements in Antarctica

The scope and intensity of human activity in the Antarctic region has changed considerably over the past 100 years, resulting in significant modifications to the Antarctic environment and its ecosystems, and to the institutional arrangements governing human activities. Since the nineteenth century, Antarctica has seen periods of heavy resource exploitation followed more latterly by swells of governmental scientific research programmes which have, in turn, led to a plethora of international agreements. By the end of the twentieth century, commercial tourism was also firmly established. Development in human engagement with the Antarctic environment has been accompanied by changes in human values, technologies and ways of thinking. This chapter sets the scene for the entire volume by providing a historical background on human activities, their management and their implications, which other chapters build upon. The purpose of this chapter is not to explore the full breadth of human activities, environmental impacts and governance arrangements in Antarctica. Rather, it aims to provide a contextual framework that can be used to anchor together the diverse subjects treated in the subsequent chapters.

Tourism-conservation enterprises as a land-use strategy in Kenya.

Since the early 1990s, nature conservation organizations in Eastern and Southern Africa have increasingly attempted to integrate their objectives with those of international development organizations, the land-use objectives of local communities and the commercial objectives of tourism businesses, in order to find new solutions for the protection of nature and wildlife outside state-protected areas. The increased inclusion of the market in conservation initiatives has led to diverse institutional arrangements involving various societal actors, such as private game reserves, conservancies and conservation enterprises. The Koija Starbeds ecolodge in Kenya – a partnership between communities, private investors and a non-governmental organization – serves as a case study for emerging institutional arrangements aimed at enabling value creation for communities from nature conservation. Based on a content analysis of data from individual semi-structured interviews and focus group interviews, as well as a document and literature review, this article reveals a range of benefits for community livelihood and conservation. It also identifies a range of longer term governance challenges, such as the need to address local political struggles, the relations between partners and transparency and accountability in the arrangement.

Carbon dioxide emissions of Antarctic tourism

Abstract The increase of tourism to the Antarctic continent may entail not only local but also global environmental impacts. These latter impacts, which are mainly caused by transport, have been generally ignored. As a result, there is a lack of data on the global impacts of Antarctic tourism in terms of energy consumption and carbon dioxide emissions. This paper presents and applies a methodology for quantifying CO2 emissions, both for the Antarctic vessel fleet as a whole and per passenger (both per trip and per day). The results indicate that the average tourist trip to Antarctica results in 5.44 t of CO2 emissions per passenger, or 0.49 t per passenger and day. Approximately 70% of these emissions are attributable to cruising and 30% to flying, which highlights the global environmental relevance of local transport for this type of tourism.

Towards a tipping point? Exploring the capacity to self-regulate Antarctic tourism using agent-based modelling

ABSTRACT Antarctica attracts tourists who want to explore its unique nature and landscapes. Antarctic tourism has rapidly grown since 1991 and is currently picking up again after the recent global economic downturn. Tourism activities are subject to the rules of the Antarctic Treaty System (ATS) and the decisions made by the Antarctic Treaty Consultative Parties (ATCPs), but within this context, the industry has considerable freedom to self-organise. The industry is self-regulated by a voluntary member-based group, the International Association of Antarctica Tour Operators (IAATO). Researchers and policy-makers express concern about IAATOs ability to deal with further tourism development and the environmental consequences. This study applies a new approach to understand what affects self-regulation, consisting of a literature review and agent-based modelling (ABM). The review identifies four challenges for self-regulation: operator commitment, tourism growth, operator diversification, and accidents. The ABM simulations help conceptualise the complex concepts and theories surrounding self-regulation. Self-regulation is measured by the capacity of the simulated self-regulatory system to maintain a majority membership at the end of 20 years. The model suggests that a number of the challenges are nonlinear and have tipping points. This approach provides insights that industry officials and policy-makers can use to proactively regulate Antarctic tourism.

Diversification of Antarctic tourism: the case of a scuba diving expedition

Tourism in Antarctica has grown substantially over recent decades and has diversified into different activities and modes of transport. This paper presents a first attempt to explore the implications of this diversification trend for Antarctic tourist experiences, wildlife and onsite management. Evidence from a passenger survey, participatory observations and expert interviews using video elicitation has been collected during, and in the context of, a diving expedition cruise. The data suggests that significant differences can be detected in the way divers and non-divers experience aspects of the trip, most notably regarding guides. The results also indicate that diverse activities generate a broader variance in attitudes and behaviours, which may have repercussions for wildlife, site use and onsite management. Given the diversification trend it is timely and necessary to revisit and consistently enforce site guidelines and visitor guidelines with an eye on multi-activity trips. In addition, further studies on the implications of this trend are needed by means of case studies, surveys looking at a wider range of tourist trips, and monitoring programmes assessing wildlife behaviour and impacts.

Short-circuiting cruise tourism practices along the Russian Barents Sea coast? The case of Arkhangelsk

The growth and popularity of polar cruise tourism in the Arctic region have raised expectations about the opportunities in this part of the world. However, the existing academic literature has never ventured further than to recall these expectations and opportunities, which means that there is hardly any insight into what is actually happening in Russian Arctic cruise tourism. This paper aims to provide a practice-based perspective with a special focus on performed and integrated practices in the production of cruise tourism along the Russian Barents Sea coast. Semi-structured interviews with key actors involved in the production of cruise tourism serve as the main source of information along with observations made during fieldwork in the Arkhangelsk region. Cruise tourism practices are facing a number of challenges in their reproduction and lack both consistency and regularity. The practice-based perspective helps to reveal how groups of actors collectively produce activities and itineraries for cruise tourists despite the structural constraints. Moreover, the paper shows how local private entrepreneurs are actively trying to configure and connect the constituting cruise tourism practices.

Collective self-governance in a marine community: expedition cruise tourism at Svalbard

ABSTRACT Collective self-governance is gaining attention in the literature for maintaining the quality of key attractions and promoting sustainable tourism. The long-term success of collective self-governance is dependent on both its internal organization and its embeddedness in external state and non-state regulations. This paper presents the marine community concept, consisting of a policy and a user community, as a framework for investigating the internal and external dynamics of collective self-governance and its ability to steer toward sustainable cruise tourism. As methodology, a case study design was chosen which was primarily studied by means of interviews with a spectrum of relevant actors concerning expedition cruise tourism at Svalbard. By applying the marine community to Svalbard expedition cruise tourism governance, we draw the following conclusions: (1) collective self-governance complements governmental regulation through access to knowledge, conflict resolution and rule-compliance based on disclosure, traceability and trust; (2) collective self-governances increasing role in the policy community alienates the expedition crew from the user community; and (3) informational overflow by co-existence of collective self-governance and state-governance challenges sustainable cruise tourism. Collective self-governance would, therefore, benefit from reflection, especially regarding the role of the user community that functions as an intermediary between state and self-governance regulations.

Easing the adoption of agent-based modelling (ABM) in tourism research

Agent-based modelling (ABM) is an emerging approach in tourism research. Despite the natural fit between theories of tourism as a complex, interconnected system, and the generative approach supported in ABM, there has been only limited integration within mainstream tourism research. This research letter reports on a recent gathering of tourism ABM researchers to define the main challenges that face the adoption of ABM in tourism research. These include technical, communications, and novelty issues. In response to these challenges, three potential strategies to ease adoption are outlined: education, awareness, and interdisciplinary teams. These findings are framed as a call for increased attention to the fit of ABM within tourism research, and a framework for negotiating constraints to adoption of this technology.