TOURISM IN ANTARCTICAPim Mekdhanasarn & Anis Mebarek

• Area: 13,829,430 km2

• Contains 90% of world’s ice• 70% of all the world's freshwater frozen

as ice • 44,890 km2 ice free area• Officially the most remote, highest,

coldest, driest, and windiest continent• Fifth-largest continent• 1.3 times larger than Europe• No indigenous or permanent habitants • In 1985, just a few thousand people visited the

area but in 2007/2008 tourist number exceeded 40,000.

BACKGROUND

• Southernmost continent• Surrounded by: Southern Ocean

LOCATION

What Antarctica’s ecosystem lacks in terms of biodiversity, it makes up for in numbers:

• 1 million pairs of breeding king penguins

• 2.5 million pairs of Adelie penguins

• 7.5 million pairs of chinstrap penguins

• 3.7 million pairs of rockhopper penguins (mainly in the

Sub-Antarctic)

• 315,000 pairs of gentoo penguins

• 12 million pairs of macaroni penguins

• 200,000 pairs of emperor penguins

• Between 250,000 and 800,00 Weddell seals

• 200,000 Ross Seals

• 30 to 70 million crab-eater seals

• 400,000 leopard seals

• 600,000 southern elephant sealshttp://www.fs.fed.us/rm/pubs/rmrs_p027/rmrs_p027_204_212.pdf

ECOSYSTEM

Antarctica is the ultimate destination for ecotourists. Three types of Antarctic tourism:1. Expensive camping trips: for naturalists, photographers and

journalists2. Ship-board visits (mainly by cruise ships)3. Over-flights

TOURIST INFORMATION

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TOURIST INFORMATION

• Visitors gain a greatly enhanced appreciation of Antarctica’s global importance

• Provides opportunity for receiving more revenue within the research stations

• Scientific activities can also benefit as tourist visits provides a useful link with the outside world and strengthens political support for Antarctic science

• Brings money into the country

TOURISM BENEFITS

TOURISM CONSEQUENSES The remoteness and

inaccessibility of Antarctica generally minimizes the amount of tourists visiting the area.

Statistics reveal that the visits made by tourists are usually short.

No local economyMap showing tourists distribution in Antarctica

TOURISM CONSEQUENSES These are the main consequences of tourism in

Antarctica:

• Littering • Taking biological or historically significant items • Pollution (oil spills or sewage) • Introduction of disease • Disturbance to breeding wildlife • Impact to landing sites • Unplanned visits to scientific bases

TOURISM CONSEQUENSES

• Waste from the cruise ships, as well as accidents• Damage to the “slowly growing moss beds” and other

species with vehicles/people going off the track • When “extreme” tourists get stranded, the rescues are

expensive – therefore with increasing amount of tourists rescue bills for the country increases.

• “Ice breakers” destroy the suitable environment for krill. Effects the food web indirectly impacting other species as well.

BAHIA PARAISO WRECKAGE• January 28th 1989 Argentine navy resupply ship named Bahia Paraiso

stopped at a US research base Palmer Station to give tourists an opportunity to explore and visit.

• On departure the vessel struck an underwater rock causing diesel fuel and other petroleum products to leak.

SUSTAINABLE TOURISM

“Refers to a level of tourism activity that can be maintained over the long term because it results in a net benefit for the social, economic, natural and cultural environments of the

area in which it takes place” (ICOMOS, ICTC, 2002)

“Tourism that encourages continued investment and maintenance of local jobs, protects and enhances local

customs and livelihoods and cultures and conserves natural landscapes and ecosystem”

MANAGEMENT STRETAGIES

Tourism/Visitor Management techniques:

• Direct visitor management by way of self-imposed limits on the sizes of groups allowed to land at sites on the continent.

• Protected areas are being set up with various levels of degrees of

protection depending on its vulnerability.

• ATS (Arctic treaty system) an aggregation of Antarctic Treaties, Laws and Regulations, and Resolutions etc. set up by governments who have research labs in Antarctica, which they have annual meetings discussing matters of common interest.

MANAGEMENT STRETAGIES

The restrictions for this site are as follows:

Maximum number of forty persons within the area at any one time

Maximum number of twelve persons inside the hut at any one time

Annual maximum number of visitors 2,000

No helicopter landings within the areas

Anyone wanting to visit needs to have permission

MANAGEMENT EXAMPLE: NORTH WESTERN COAST of CAPE EVANS

The main tourist feature at this site is the “Terra Nova” hut built in January 1911 by

the British Antarctic Terra Nova

Positive Aspects • Guidelines provide an opportunity to examine whether or not the exploitation of sites for tourism purposes is

appropriate or not.

• Sites may need to be put temporarily or permanently off limits for tourism.

• Site-specific guidelines are useful to inform visitors about the specific characteristics of a place.

• They may be useful to streamline the use of a site for tourism purposes and to minimise potential impacts.

Negative Aspects • Development of site-specific guidelines is likely to be slow.

• Guidelines are developed only after tourism activities are well established

Opinion• Site specific guidelines do in fact help to maintain and control the growing situation of increased visits to the site. • Without the restrictions there would have been higher potential for physical damages to the site.

• Difficulty comes when trying to maintain the growing demand for the visits.

MANAGEMENT EVALUATION: SITE SPECIFIC GUIDELINES

MANAGEMENT EVALUATION: ENVIRONMENTAL AUDITS OF RESEARCH BASES

“Environmental audits are carried out around bases, on land and in the sea to assess the impact that the base and its activities are having on the area around it”

Positive Aspects:• The audits help to stabilize and maintain the environment they research within.

• It forces some bases to experiment with alternative energy sources as to cut down on environmental impacts that the base has upon Antarctica.

Negative Aspects• The audits can limit the amount of research the bases can have as they are forced to decrease the amount of emission

they put out.

• Can be expensive for the bases to change and adapt to the new rules and regulations set by the limitations.

Opinion:• Audits are a good way of maintaining stable environmental pressures that the research labs have upon Antarctica.

• They are lab specific therefore there will be a higher chance of reducing the amount of environmental damage each will have upon the environment, as well as sustaining their performance in research.

• But with the environmental damage becoming more severe and costly, it is still worth for Antarctica to continue its audits.

“Objectives: working within the Antarctic Treaty System and other international agreements for example MARPOL and promoting cooperation between private sector

travel and the international scientific community in the Antarctic”

Positive Aspects• Promotes safe and environmentally sound private-sector travel to the Antarctic. This is done through several ways:

Coordinate itineraries so that no more than 100 people are ashore at any one time in any one place. Site-specific and activity guidelines Pre- and post-visit activity reporting Passenger, crew and staff briefings Previous Antarctic experience for tour staff

Negative Aspects• IAATO are in fact encouraging visits to a fragile environment

• IAATO has no real authority.

Opinion• To prevent tourists from visiting Antarctica altogether is impossible.

• Allows an organized and sustainable tourism to take place.

MANAGEMENT EVALUATION: INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF ANTARCTIC TOUR OPERATORS

Positive Aspects of Fill in the booklets before entering Antarctica:

• It insures that the tourists will be more responsible and aware of the environmental pressures that they will putting on Antarctica, therefore will reduce this.

• It provides the officials with sufficient data to manage the change that tourism has upon Antarctica, therefore will be ready to apply new changes for the future.

• The booklets can also discourage people from entering Antarctica therefore decreasing the number of tourists

Negative Aspects of Fill in the booklet before entering Antarctica:

• Its hard to implement because Antarctica does not have a government.

• It is also very time consuming for the officials to go through the booklets.

Opinion:

• This strategy will only be successful if people are honest with their answers which is not always the case.

• It is very expensive to implement because of the increasing number of tourists visiting Antarctica

MANAGEMENT EVALUATION: FILL IN BOOKLETS BEFORE ENTERING ANTARCTICA

SITES TO LOOK AT FOR RESEACHhttp://www.wilderness.net/library/documents/cessford.pdf

http://research.nottingham.ac.uk/NewsReviews/newsDisplay.aspx?id=446

http://www.antarcticanz.govt.nz/downloads/information/infosheets/tourism.pdf http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/04/14/world/main611873.shtml

http://www.concierge.com/cntraveler/blogs/perrinpost/2007/04/last_night_60_m.html

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/travel/holiday_type/cruises/article1886800.ece

http://www.iaato.org/guidelines.html

http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/15279.pdf

http://www.theage.com.au/news/activities--interests/cruising/cruising-on-thin-ice/2008/10/08/1223145445687.html