Search

The dissemination of tourism is a recent phenomenon that became particularly important in the 1960s and the systematic study of its relation to climate is even more recent. When included in the theoretical approaches to tourism motivation the climate, seen as an asset or service, becomes a resource that can be evaluated. This paper looks into various attempts to quantify the "climate resource" in the determination of the tourism potential of a given region and summarizes the importance of climate on tourists' motivation. Tourism is one of the economic sectors where climate change is expected to have a substantial impact due to climate alterations in tourist locations. Conversely, tourism activities contribute to intensify climate changes due to an increase in greenhouse gas emissions. The second part of this paper addresses the possible interactions between climate change and tourism, as well as possible mitigation and adaptation measures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]