Tourism and climate change - A discussion of suitable strategies for Austria

Tourism is both a major contributor to climate change and also one of the sectors more heavily impacted. Developing and implementing adaptation and mitigation measures are of particular importance, as the extent of climate risks in the second half of the century can still be significantly influenced by effective global actions. This paper is based on an in-depth report on tourism and climate change for the tourism destination of Austria, summarizing the current scientific knowledge and a related stakeholder discussion. Against this background, the paper at hand discusses possible fields of action, examples of suitable measures, and related challenges. It shows how to distinguish different levels of action and develop related adaptation strategies for the traveler (consumer adaptation), the tourist operation (business adaptation), the regional destination (destination adaptation) and the destination of Austria (national destination policy and adaptation). However, the discussion also shows that current incremental progress may be - despite its many successes - too slow for the challenging task. The experiences around Covid-19 have shown that normative instruments do have the power to affect significant trend reversals, including a change in lifestyle. The wealth of adaptation measures presented in this paper should be incorporated into a vision such as the climate friendly "Paris-Lifestyle" - a tangible change and a common societal task. Management implications: The effects of climate change can still be influenced to avoid significant effects in the second half of the century. However, this requires a focus on normative measures on the national and European level. The compilation of methodological approaches shows that, in addition to a strong normative approach, a combination of economic, behavioral economic planning and moderating methods can also be used. In the area of behavioral economics and nudging in particular, the existing options have hardly ever been applied. For managers in tourism businesses, this is where the greatest potential is seen.