The impacts of climate change on Australian tourism destinations: Developing adaptation and response strategies a scoping study
The impacts of climate change on Australian tourism destinations: Developing adaptation and response strategies a scoping study Report
- Author(s): Turton, S., Hadwen, W., Wilson, R.
- Published: 2009
- Publisher: Cooperative Research Centre for Sustainable Tourism Pty Ltd
Abstract: Following discussions within the Tourism and Climate Change Taskforce in 2007 – 2008, the Sustainable Tourism Cooperative Research Centre (STCRC) decided to undertake a study of the potential adaptations to climate change in five key tourist destinations in Australia: Kakadu National Park, the Cairns region (including the Great Barrier Reef and Wet Tropics rainforest), the Blue Mountains, the Barossa Valley and the Victorian Alps. The Department of Resources, Energy and Tourism provided funding support for the study. The overall aim of this project was to examine the climate change impacts (economic and non-economic) on the tourism sector in five Australian regional tourism destinations (Figure 1) over the next 10, 40 and 60 years (2020, 2050 and 2070). The goal of the project was to build a framework to inform and prioritise adaptation strategies which can be undertaken by destinations and tourism businesses. To do this, the climate change vulnerability of each destination was assessed, with a focus on the potential impacts on tourism infrastructure, activities and operational costs. The project was intended to ascertain the adequacy of available data and information to enable research-specific findings. This research project has examined existing knowledge on anticipated biophysical changes and, through primary research (stakeholder interviews and social learning workshops), gauged the expected adaptive approaches of destination communities and the tourism sector to these changes for 2020, 2050 and 2070, and then estimated likely economic consequences. It is expected that key outcomes will be an early assessment of the adaptive capacity of tourism communities, estimates of costs and the development of a robust research agenda based on refining an initial model of tourism, business and destination adaptation. This technical report is divided into four distinct parts. Part 1 (Chapters 1 and 2) provides an introduction to the project in a global context, including the aims and objectives of the study and an introduction to the five case study regions. It then describes the methodology applied to ascertain the non-economic impacts of climate change at four of the five case study regions (Chapter 2). The five case studies are then presented as five separate chapters in Part 2 (Chapters 3 – 7). The Victorian Alps case study was derived from a separate, larger multi-sector study of climate change impacts and adaptation in the region, and the authors have provided a summary of their work in relation to the tourism sector in Chapter 7 of this technical report. It should be stressed that the approach and methodology in that study were different to the other four case studies, and this presents some limitations when integrating across case studies in Part 4 of this report. Part 3 (Chapter 8) deals with the economic impacts of climate change across the five destinations, based on The Enormous Regional Model (TERM). This may be considered a preliminary assessment at the case study level of the expected impacts of climate change on Gross Regional Product and projected rates of growth in domestic and international tourism for 2020, 2050 and 2070. In Part 4 (Chapters 9 and 10) the findings across the five case study regions are integrated and synthesised, and a future agenda is set for applying the approach to other Australian tourism regions. Chapter 9 provides a discussion and integration across the Kakadu, Cairns, Blue Mountains and Barossa Valley case study regions. In particular, themes for mitigation and adaptation are considered that have emerged from the separate case studies that might have wider applicability across other Australian tourist destinations. Finally, Chapter 10 provides recommendations from the study for future research in the area of climate change and adaptation in tourism destinations. The chapter also provides suggestions and guidance for how this might achieved in a practical sense, in terms of a tourism sector ‘tool kit’.
- Urls: https://trove.nla.gov.au/work/31749553?q&versionId=38518511
- Publisher Location: Gold Coast