A travel to the circumpolar territories of the planet for recreational, leisure, or research purposes; an activity essential to the Nordic countries because of its direct effects on the environmental, social, cultural, and economic sectors of indigenous societies of the Arctic.
Published in Chapter:
Innovation-Driven Growth of Tourist Destinations in the Russian Arctic: Challenges to Sustainable Development
Anna Ivolga (Stavropol State Agrarian University, Russia), Alexander Trukhachev (Ministry of Tourism and Recreation of Stavropol Region, Russia), and Yulia Elfimova (Stavropol State Agrarian University, Russia)
Copyright: © 2019
|Pages: 25
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-6954-1.ch012
Abstract
The attractiveness of the Arctic as a tourist destination has been growing. The growth is determined by a number of competitive advantages of the region in the eyes of foreign tourists. Along with higher income to those countries involved, mass tourism brings serious challenges in remote Arctic areas: increasing pollution through tourist traffic, risk of environmental damage because of accidents with cruise ships. One of the possible solutions to the coexistence between the exploration of Arctic tourist destinations and sustainable development is an innovation-driven growth. In the sensitive Arctic areas, traditional approaches to the development of tourism business are not applicable. Innovation approach represents a new concept of how tourism can at the same time bring economic benefits to remote and peripheral Arctic areas and ensure sustainable development of a fragile environment. The goal of this chapter is to define the categories of innovations applicable in Arctic tourism, including process, marketing, institutional, management, product, and service innovations.