Abstract
Coastal erosion and inundation represent the main impacts of climate change and the consequential sea level rise (SLR) on beaches. The resultant deterioration of coastal habitats and decline in beach tourism revenue has been a primary concern for coastal managers and researchers. Nevertheless, the extent of SLR on beach tourism in Egypt remains relatively unknown. Therefore, this study investigates the relationship between beach width shrinkage due to SLR and the loss in tourist resort revenue. We use the hedonic pricing approach, which combines economic and environmental variables, to determine the environmental impact on beach tourism along 14 km of the coast of Sahl Hasheesh and Makadi Bay, Hurghada, Egypt. The resort revenue depends on the cumulative benefits from the market price of the resort rooms, which is a function of morphological variables and tourism variables. Three regression models (semi-log, double-log, and custom-log) were used to select the most appropriate functional hedonic model. Three coastal slopes were considered (0.03, 0.06, and 0.12) to address the uncertainty in beach width. When 0.06 coastal slope is used, the expected losses in revenue are 84,000, 220,000, and 546,000 USD/day period (representing 3%, 7%, and 18%) for 2030, 2050, and 2100, respectively, considering the lowest scenario representative concentration pathway (RCP2.6); for the worst case (RCP8.5 SLR), the expected losses are 142,000, 369,000, and 897,000 USD/day period (representing 5%, 12%, and 30%) for 2030, 2050, and 2100, respectively.
Highlights
Tourism in Egypt is considered a key source of national income and foreign currency
This study aims to evaluate the relation between beach retreats caused by sea level rise (SLR), considering representative concentration pathway (RCP) scenarios issued by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) (2013) and the consequential loss in resort revenues in the coastal areas of Sahl Hasheesh and Makadi Bay, Hurghada, Egypt, using the hedonic pricing approach, which incorporates both economic and environmental variables
Beach retreat/erosion based on SLR negatively impacts beach-tourism revenues and will be a challenge for the national government, which requires more attention and the implementation of strategic management plans
Summary
Tourism in Egypt is considered a key source of national income and foreign currency. The direct contribution of the travel and tourism sector to Egypt’s gross domestic product was 5.6% in 2017 and 11.9% in 2018 [1]. Beach tourism is considered one of the major economic growth factors in the tourism industry. Beach tourism along the Red Sea of Egypt contributes a significant portion of the gross national product [2]. The Hurghada coastal region has recently experienced major economic growth in the tourism industry, in associated resorts and villages [3]. Red Sea beaches are ranked as the second-biggest attraction of foreigners to the country, following weather/climate features [5]
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