Tourism Footprint Research Articles

From murals to microclimate: assessing the ecological footprint of tourism at Ajanta Caves

From murals to microclimate: assessing the ecological footprint of tourism at Ajanta Caves

An Extended Pre-testing Protocol in the Lead-up to Field Studies

To establish whether interventions ultimately change behavior, they are best tested in the field. However, there is no clear consensus on how to pre-select such interventions. To address this, we propose an extended pre-testing protocol in the lead-up to field studies. This extended protocol combines different approaches by (1) distinguishing between (a) an intervention triggering the corresponding theoretical construct, (b) the construct being linked to behavioral intentions, (c) the intervention affecting behavioral intentions; and (2) accounting for emotional reactions to intervention materials. We illustrate the protocol in an online experiment ( N = 636) focusing on the example behavior of opting out of daily hotel room cleans—a behavior which can help reduce the environmental footprint of tourism. The results illustrate the value of the extended pre-testing protocol in tourism and hospitality research and beyond. It increases understanding of underlying intervention mechanisms and ensures interventions are suitable for the field.

Journey to Discover the Footprint of Tourism from the Perspective of Ecological Modernization

This research aims to investigate tourism's environmental impacts through the lens of Ecological Modernization Theory (EMT). The study examines how tourism development, economic growth, green innovation, and government effectiveness affect the environment. According to the Augmented Mean Group (AMG), the results revealed that tourism growth and economic expansion negatively impact the environment. In contrast, green innovation and government effectiveness have positive effects. The study also provides country-specific coefficient estimates. The empirical results support the validity of the EMT across the panel, specifically for Germany, France, the UK, and Russia.

Knowledge Mapping of Tourism Footprint: A Bibliometric Review Based on CiteSpace

Sustainable tourism plays an important role in enhancing economic benefits, promoting the transformation of development methods, and strengthening international communication. And the tourism footprint is gaining research attention as an essential means for evaluating the sustainability of tourism. However, there have been few attempts to draw a scientific investigation map of the tourism footprint. With the purpose of reviewing systematically the research status and providing ideas for future research in this field, this study conducts a scientometric analysis of 517 academic publications on tourism footprint with CiteSpace. We find that tourism footprint is gaining attention and promotion on a worldwide scale which is becoming a popular multidisciplinary study area. China, the United States, and England have the most productive institutions. There is a marked trend of cross-fertilization of research in this field with other disciplines. And we summarize three predominant research themes: the economic impacts of tourism development, the assessment of tourism footprint, and the promotion of sustainable tourism. Developing a consensus model for tourism footprint accounting and establishing a dynamic monitoring mechanism may get more attention in the future.

The performance of mixed and penalized effects models in predicting the value of the ecological footprint of tourism

In recent decades, the issue of ecological footprint (EF) in the world has become a serious anxiety among environmental stakeholders. This anxiety is more in top tourism attracting countries. The purpose of this research is the performance of mixed and penalized effects models in predicting the value of the EF of tourism in the top eight countries of tourism destinations. The World Bank and Global Footprint Network databases have been used in this study. Penalized regression and MCMC models have been used to estimate the EF over the past 19 years (2000-2018). The findings of the research showed that the amount of ecological footprint in China, France and Italy is much higher than other countries. In addition, based on the results, a slight improvement in the performance of penalized models to linear regression was observed. The comparison of the models shows that in the Ridge and Elastic Net models, more indicators were selected than Lasso, but Lasso has a better predictive performance than other models on ecological footprint. Therefore, the use of penalized models is only slightly better than linear regression, but they provide the selection of appropriate indices for model parsimoniousness. The results showed that the penalized models are powerful tools that can provide a significant performance in the accuracy and prediction of the EF variable in tourism attracting countries.

An International Comparative Analysis of Approaches to Measure the Carbon Footprint of Tourism

Tourism contributes significantly to climate change. However, it has continuously been excluded from national emission frameworks globally. Climate action must play a leading role in national tourism plans by measuring, monitoring and reporting tourism emissions for sustainable destination management. The purpose of this study is to identify the most applicable approach to measure the carbon footprint of tourism internationally. This study conducted a comparative analysis of the international approaches and toolkits available to measure tourism emissions. Consequently, contributes new knowledge to tourism policymakers by outlining the advantages, limitations and barriers of utilizing each approach. The findings identified that the most favorable approaches cannot be used internationally due to tourism data limitations. Thus, barriers to establishing and maintaining a standardized measurement and system to accurately monitor the level of tourism decarbonization worldwide are created. Nevertheless, tourism policymakers can begin to minimize these barriers by collecting credible data to establish the Tourism Satellite Accounts. Climate change is a significant crisis facing humanity, and until now, this research has not been completed.

Characteristics and drivers of changes in the carbon footprint of urban tourism in the post-COVID-19 era: A case study of Xi'an

COVID-19 pandemic prevention and control measures provide valuable social experimental opportunities for exploring the factors that affect changes in the urban tourism carbon footprint (TCFu). The study uses the carbon emission coefficient and energy consumption coefficient to calculate the TCFu of the transport, accommodation, catering, and recreational activity sectors, taking Xi'an from 2014 to 2020 as a case study. It analyzes the characteristics of the carbon footprint changes and their drivers in each sector. The results show that compared to before the outbreak of the pandemic, in the period afterwards, the TCFu decreased by 60.46%. The carbon footprint of tourism transport decreased the most. Carbon intensity has a significant inhibitory effect on the TCFu growth, and as drivers, the consumption level and population size shifted from promoting to inhibiting the TCFu. It emphasizes the importance of developing low-carbon tourism transportation to reduce the TCFu, providing a scientific basis for promoting the green transformation of urban tourism.

Measuring the carbon footprint of inbound tourism at a destination level

Destination’s dependency on aviation leads to inbound tourists producing higher levels of emissions than domestic tourists. This paper aimed to measure the first baseline carbon footprint of inbound tourism at a popular island destination, without the Tourism Satellite Accounts. The environmentally extended input-output life-cycle analysis is the most favourable approach to measure tourism emissions. However, this approach cannot be applied internationally due to the lack of tourism data. Therefore, this study implemented an integrated bottom-up approach to successfully measure inbound tourism emissions. According to this study, inbound tourism to Ireland generates 11.78 MtCO2eq, this is a conservative estimate due to the assumptions made to overcome the data limitations. Nevertheless, this study contributes to the increasing body of knowledge on tourism emissions as it establishes Ireland’s first baseline carbon footprint of inbound tourism and demonstrates the need to upskill the tourism industry to actively measure, monitor and manage tourism decarbonisation.

The carbon footprint of regional tourism trips: insights from environmentally extended regional input output analysis

Tourism is an important and almost certainly increasing driver of anthropogenic climate change. However, intelligence on the total greenhouse gas emissions related to tourism trips – including travel to and from the destination – is limited, especially at sub-national destination scale. This paper uses an environmentally extended input-output approach to estimate the total greenhouse gas emissions consequent on inbound and domestic tourism trips in Wales, a region of the UK. We use the UN World Tourism Organisation (TSA) concept of visitors and trips to estimate the overall carbon footprint of tourism at around 3.4 megatons in 2019, 8.7% of total territorial emissions. We further compare these results with estimates for 2007 which suggests that there has been a modest reduction of under 2% per annum since 2007, but with significant data issues affecting comparability. Apparently slow progress in decarbonisation, including an increase in intercontinental visits to Wales over the period, suggest tourism here has not yet embarked upon a climate-responsible transformation.

Carbon Footprint Analysis of Tourism Life Cycle: The Case of Guilin from 2011 to 2022

Low-carbon tourism is an important way for the tourism industry to achieve the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals and the goals of carbon peaking and carbon neutrality. In order to promote the development of Guilin as a world-class tourism city and ensure the sustainable development of the tourism industry in Guilin, this paper combines the concept of carbon footprint and the theory of life cycle to build a tourists’ carbon footprint life cycle analysis model of Guilin. Taking tourists in Guilin as an example, the composition and changes of tourists’ carbon footprint are dynamically analyzed. The research shows that: (1) The overall tourism carbon footprint of Guilin showed an upward trend during 2011–2019. From 2020 to 2022, due to the impact of COVID-19, Guilin’s tourism carbon footprint has decreased significantly. The per capita carbon footprint of tourism in Guilin showed a downward trend from 2011 to 2022; (2) The order of the size of Guilin’s tourism carbon footprint is tourism transportation > tourism catering > tourism accommodation > tourism activities; (3) From 2011 to 2022, the carbon footprint of tourism transportation in Guilin showed an obvious narrowing state, while the carbon footprint of tourism accommodation, tourism activities, and tourism catering showed an obvious expanding trend. Based on the characteristics of the carbon footprint of Guilin’s tourism and the current situation of the development of Guilin’s tourism, this paper puts forward suggestions on reducing carbon emissions, forms a new tool for evaluating and constructing low-carbon tourism, and provides a scientific basis and practical reference significance for the sustainable development of low-carbon tourism in Guilin.

Striving towards carbon neutrality in emerging markets: the combined influence of international tourism and eco-friendly technology

ABSTRACT In the past few decades, the tourism and hospitality sector has not only witnessed significant growth but also contributed tremendously to economic progress with lease inputs. This fastest-growing sector creates a number of environmental challenges, especially in emerging markets where the carbon footprint of tourism constitutes a large share of CO2 emissions. This study explores the effect of international tourism, renewable energy consumption (REN), and eco-friendly technology on CO2 emissions in emerging markets. The AMG, Driscoll-Kraay and Prais-Winsten regression confirm the adverse effects of international tourism on the environment, whereas technological innovation and REN mitigate CO2 emissions. Furthermore, economic growth and population increase CO2 emissions, while foreign direct investment (FDI) reduces CO2 emissions. Although the direct effect of technological innovation is insignificant, the indirect impact is negative and statistically significant; confirming the moderating effect of eco-friendly technology on the relationship between international tourism and CO2 emissions. The MMQR results suggest that REN reduces CO2 emissions across all quantiles. On the other hand, technological innovation significantly reduces CO2 emissions in lower and median quantiles, whereas international tourism and economic growth reduce CO2 emissions across all quantiles. Various directions of causality were reported alongside relevant policy directions.

Carbon Footprint and Its Composition: A Comparison between Domestic and International Tourists to Chenzhou City, China

This study aims to provide a scientific basis to address the strategies for sustainable development of urban tourism industry. By using the Life Cycle Assessment method, it decomposes tourism activities into seven different functional units (different tourism activities)-transportation, catering, accommodation, sightseeing, shopping, entertainment and waste disposal-based on the expression of services provided by tourism activities, and determine the boundary range of each different functional unit in terms of the pathways and the functional orientation of the products (resources and energy) provided by the services of each functional unit. A “bottom-up” model is then constructed to measure the carbon footprint of tourism. Based on data collected from various sources for the period 2014–2019, it compares the composition and differences of domestic and international tourists’ carbon footprints in Chenzhou City, one of inland mountainous regions of central China, through several steps, including target and scope definition, inventory analysis, impact evaluation and life cycle interpretation. Results show that domestic tourists contributed more than 90% of the total annual carbon footprints to the city, ranging from 76.8809 × 106 kg to 194.6067 × 106 kg. Transportation is the dominant category, accounting for over 80% of the total carbon footprints. The study suggests that optimizing tourism resources, reducing transportation distances, and switching to low-carbon modes can effectively reduce the tourism carbon footprints in Chenzhou and similar regions. This study reveals the structural characteristics of the tourism carbon footprint and its influencing factors and provides valuable insights for policy development involving energy saving and low carbon tourism, thus enhancing the long-term sustainability of tourism development in an urban tourism destination like Chenzhou.

Systematic Literature Review Analysing Smart Tourism Destinations in Context of Sustainable Development: Current Applications and Future Directions

The growing popularity of smart tourism destinations (STDs) has increased the need to investigate their potential impact on sustainable development. This systematic literature review (SLR) aims to analyse the past achievements and future directions of smart tourism destinations in the context of sustainable development. The review was conducted through a systematic literature review that examined 20 papers using a rigorous framework of the research problem, the primary delimitation of the research, and the definition of the data collection and extraction tools. The review focuses on identifying and analysing the current state of the research on SLRs in smart tourism destinations and their implications for sustainable development. This includes the research questions, methods, journals, dates of publications, and key themes. The review also examines the implications and limitations of SLRs in this field, and it identifies gaps in the literature and areas for future directions. The review found that SLRs have been used to examine the impacts of smart tourism destinations on various aspects of sustainable development, such as economic, social, and environmental aspects. Additionally, the review found that there is a growing interest in smart cities, with a focus on reducing the environmental footprint of tourism and promoting sustainable tourism development. The review also identified the emerging research areas in the literature, such as the achievement of the sustainable development goals, the adoption of green IT, smart energy, and waste management.

Carbon footprint of tourism in Spain: Covid-19 impact and a look forward to recovery

Tourism is very vulnerable to climate change and the disruption of Covid-19, facing two challenges: fighting climate change pursuing its carbon emissions goals, and recovering from the complex pandemic effects. We contribute to the incomplete understanding of tourism emissions pandemic impact and in different post-covid recovery scenarios. Using official data on tourists' consumption, we calculate the carbon footprint of tourism in Spain in 2019 and 2020 under different recovery pathways, including changes in consumption patterns and emissions efficiency, using a multiregional input-output model. Results show that the carbon footprint of tourism in Spain fell by 63% in 2020 compared to pre-pandemic levels, which would be aligned with the current sectoral decarbonisation target. However, the new tourists’ consumption patterns resulting from the pandemic are insufficient to increase tourism sustainability if they imply pre-pandemic consumption levels. The results provide empirical ground for the binary debate on “recovery or reform”.

Research hotspots, future trends and influencing factors of tourism carbon footprint: a bibliometric analysis

ABSTRACT To comprehensively analyze the current research status, hot trends, and influencing factors of tourism carbon footprint, this paper conducts a bibliometric analysis. We find that (1) tourism carbon footprint is the topic with the highest attention in the field of tourism footprint research; (2) economic effects, tourism carbon footprint accounting methods, and the consciousness drive of each subject in the tourism industry are still important research directions; (3) tourism activity items such as accommodation and transportation are the main influencing factors while the behavioral preferences and characteristics of tourists, government and tourism operators become important directions for future empirical research.

A panel cointegration analysis of linkages between international trade and tourism: case of India and South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) countries.

The study is undertaken to examine international trade and tourism nexus in case of India and SAARC countries. To achieve the objective, panel cointegration is employed over the period of 22years (1997 to 2018). The results from both first and second generation cointegration tests indicated the existence of long run equilibrium among tourism, export, and import. Albeit there are differences between short-term and long-term associations, the findings from autoregressive distributed lag approach indicates strong long-term linkages between trade and tourism. A possible channel of exports exerting a positive influence on tourist arrival is that the products in foreign markets increase the recognition and image of a country eventually leading to more tourists. Moreover, increased exports are expected to increase business trips further increasing the leisure trips and hence a strong linkage between export and tourism. On the other hand, a possible explanation of positive effect of imports on tourism could be that the destination countries which provide tourists with products according to their home taste encourage tourists to travel to these countries. The findings provided in the paper have strong implications for expanding India's tourism footprint in the region.

Where Have Carbon Emissions Gone? Evidence of Inbound Tourism in China

Tourism is emerging as an important contributor sector to carbon emissions. As inbound tourism is the main component of tourism activities, measuring and evaluating the carbon footprint of inbound tourism can help achieve low-carbon development of the global tourism industry. Based on the carbon footprint theory, this study describes the distribution and transfer path of China’s inbound tourism carbon footprint by using the China multi regional input-output model embedded in the inbound tourism satellite account. The results reveal that embodied carbon emissions (ECE) of inbound tourism is higher than direct carbon emissions, and carbon emissions intensity is close to the average economic. Therefore, it is difficult for inbound tourism to achieve the dual goals of stimulating economic growth and emission mitigation. The ECE of inbound tourism has obvious inter-provincial transfer characteristics. Inner Mongolia and Guangdong are the largest provinces with net outflows/inflows of ECE, with net outflows of 1.47 million tons and inflows of 2.66 million tons. Besides, the ECE mainly flows from the northeast and northwest regions to the southern and eastern regions. From the perspective of industry transfer, 72.2% of ECE of inbound tourism comes from the power sector.

Dirty dance: tourism and environment

ABSTRACT Tourism was one of the fastest-growing sectors of the global economy before the COVID-19 pandemic, accounting for around 10% of global GDP. This has created a number of challenges including environmental degradation, especially in small island countries where the carbon footprint of tourism constitute a substantial share of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. This study investigates the impact of tourism on CO2 emissions in a relatively homogenous panel of 15 Caribbean countries over the period 1960–2019. The results show that international tourist arrivals have a statistically and economically significant effect on CO2 emissions, after controlling for other economic, institutional and social factors. Managing tourism sustainably requires a comprehensive set of policies and reforms aimed at reducing its environmental impact, and curbing excessive dependency on fossil fuel-based energy consumption.

The role of holiday styles in shaping the carbon footprint of leisure travel within the European Union

Leisure travel within the European Union (EU) contributes significantly to the carbon footprint of global tourism. Distance travelled is a main factor in this impact, but some of its determinants remain unexplored. We examined the role of tourists' holiday preferences in shaping the carbon footprint of leisure travel within the EU by calculating demand and impact indicators associated with eight holiday styles. We find a substantial and equivalent carbon footprint for visiting relatives, nature tourism and sea, sun and sand tourism, but a higher carbon intensity of travel per trip for the latter. This is due to widespread demand for sea, sun, and sand tourism despite the concentration of destinations in Southern Europe. Furthermore, international travel within the EU is on average three times more carbon intensive than domestic travel. Our insights suggest that tourists’ holiday preferences can be leveraged for the sustainable development of leisure travel within the EU.

Spatiotemporal quantification of key environmental changes in Stok and Kang Yatze regions of Ladakh Himalaya, India

Tourism fuelled economic transformation of Ladakh region is bringing a change in demography and livelihood preferences leading to increased exploitation of scarce natural resources. In addition to the nerve centre of tourism-related activities (Leh city), rural hinterlands of Ladakh are also witnessing a stark transformation in land and resource use patterns. In this study, we quantified and assessed the changes in key environmental parameters of rural Ladakh between 1969 and 2020. We observed a decrease in glacier area, glacier volume and vegetation cover by approximately 19%, 13% and 14%, whereas built-up and lake area increased by approximately 238% and 122%, respectively. Simultaneously, local population of the region doubled while tourism footprint increased by approximately 620-folds. The study highlights the environmental changes happening at a higher rate in rural regions around Leh city. Therefore, need of the hour is to recognize the disruptive changes being brought in the traditional way of life and to devise strategies to reorient the development paradigm towards sustainable resource use and management.