Understanding And Quantifying Mountain Tourism

All around the world, mountain tourism is driven by the human desire to experience nature in unique settings. In turn, tourism has proved to be a lifeline for many communities in mountain regions, and it can play a leading role in sustaining systems that contribute to protect these fragile ecosystems from overexploitation and support their adaptation to climate change. When the pandemic led to lockdowns, mountains became an attractive option for travellers looking for less crowded destinations and open-air experiences. Now, as international travel returns, we have an opportunity to rethink mountain tourism, its impact on natural resources and livelihoods, and how to manage it better. In this regard, measuring the volume of visitors to mountains is the first vital step we must take. With the right data, we can better control the dispersal of visitor flows, support adequate planning, improve knowledge on visitor patterns, build sustainable products in line with consumer needs, and create suitable policies which will foster sustainable development and make sure tourism activities benefit local communities. This study, jointly developed by the Mountain Partnership Secretariat of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the World Tourism Organization (UNWTO), addresses the current lack of relevant data and so improves our understanding of mountain tourism. The study also identifies trends and provides a set of recommendations to advance the measurement of mountain tourism, including the enhancement of official tourism statistics through the use of big data and new technologies. The United Nations proclaimed 2022 as the International Year of Sustainable Mountain Development to increase awareness of its importance and to contribute to the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). That same year also marked the 20th anniversary from the first International Year ever devoted to mountains as well as the 20th anniversary of the Mountain Partnership. UNWTO and the Mountain Partnership have been long collaborating to advance the contribution the tourism sector can make to the achievement of the 2030 Agenda and the 17 SDGs. This study is a follow-up to the 2021 joint UNWTO/FAO publication Mountain Tourism – Towards a More Sustainable Path. It will enhance our understanding of tourism in mountains and the need to improve not only how we measure its volume, but also its full economic, social and environmental impacts, to ensure a more sustainable, resilient, accessible and inclusive development of mountain tourism that leaves no one behind.

In the contemporary landscape, the significance of business tourism has surged, drawing substantial attention from researchers in the realms of social and management sciences. Defined as an individual's travel outside their local town for business opportunities, transactions, enjoyment, and learning, business tourism has undergone notable shifts, especially in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. The book titled Shifts in Knowledge Sharing and Creativity for Business Tourism emerges as a solution to unravel the positive and negative impacts of the pandemic on business traveling, specifically addressing changes in the frequency of business tourism and its effects on employee learning and knowledge transfer skills. This book meticulously covers a spectrum of aspects related to the evolving landscape of business tourism post-COVID-19. Its objective is multifaceted: first, to underscore the importance of business tourism in the domains of social sciences and management sciences literature; second, to deepen the understanding of how business tourism facilitates learning across diverse theories and concepts through interactions with different cultures; third, to explore the transferability of knowledge learned in various places to domestic implementations; fourth, to enhance individual and organizational innovation and creativity skills catalyzed by business tourism; and fifth, to delve into the dynamics of tacit and explicit knowledge transfer in the post-pandemic business environment.

Mountainous and rural areas throughout the world have continually been attributed with several hinderances including poverty, faulty governance, and susceptibility to natural disasters. However, with the recent development of tourism, these provinces have seen a strong rise in visitation. Despite this increase in economic sustainability, planners are still presented with many challenges as they try to balance developmental and ecological considerations. Global Opportunities and Challenges for Rural and Mountain Tourism provides emerging research exploring the integration of mountain tourism development and innovative practices for managing contemporary issues and challenges of tourism in these regions including socio-economic impacts, role of stakeholders, and promotional strategies for sustainable tourism development. Featuring coverage on a broad range of topics such as cultural heritage, marketing strategies, and value chain systems, this book is ideally designed for travel agents, tour directors, tour developers, hotel managers, hospitality and tourism professionals, industry practitioners, researchers, geographical scientists, planners, academicians, and students.

Mountains have long held an appeal for people around the world. This book focusses on the diversity of perspectives, interaction and role of tourism within these areas. Providing a vital update to the current literature, it considers the interdisciplinary context of communities, the creation of mountain tourism experiences and the impacts tourism has on these environments.

FAO’s most recent global synthesis on planted forests was released in 2009 and the last Unasylva on planted forests was published in 2005. Developed together with a coalition of external partners, including the International Union of Forest Research Organizations (IUFRO) task force on planted forests and the TreeDivNet network, Issue 254 hereby responds to the need for wider information-sharing on data, tools and approaches available for leveraging the contributions of planted forests to meet the target of increasing the global forest area of 3 percent by 2030, which Global Forest Goal 1 provides for. Unasylva issue 254 was launched in November 2023 at the International Congress on Planted Forests 2023 (ICPF2023) – the first edition of this global forum to be held in Africa (Nairobi, Kenya).

Mountain tourism has the potential for driving the socioeconomic growth and development of local communities. This publication presents among others a systematic definition of mountain tourism; an overview of the development in different parts of the world, and recent structural changes affecting this segment as a result of new market patterns.

In May 1993 the British Mountaineering Council met to discuss the future of high altitude tourism. Of concern to attendees were reports of queues on Everest and reference was made to mountaineer Peter Boardman calling Everest an ‘amphitheater of the ego’. Issues raised included environmental and social responsibility and regulations to minimize impacts. In the years that have followed there has been a surge of interest in climbing Everest, with one day in 2012 seeing 234 climbers reach the summit. Participation in mountaineering tourism has surely escalated beyond the imagination of those who attended the meeting 20 years ago. This book provides a critical and comprehensive analysis of all pertinent aspects and issues related to the development and the management of the growth area of mountaineering tourism. By doing so it explores the meaning of adventure and special reference to mountain-based adventure, the delivering of adventure experience and adventure learning and education. It further introduces examples of settings (alpine environments) where a general management framework could be applied as a baseline approach in mountaineering tourism development. Along with this general management framework, the book draws evidence from case studies derived from various mountaineering tourism development contexts worldwide, to highlight the diversity and uniqueness of management approaches, policies and practices. Written by leading academics from a range of disciplinary backgrounds, this insightful book will provide students, researchers and academics with a better understanding of the unique aspects of tourism management and development of this growing form of adventure tourism across the world.