Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-4rdpn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-10T01:46:05.402Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Ittoqqortoormiit and the National Park of Greenland: a community's option for tourism development

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 May 2013

Daniela Tommasini*
Affiliation:
NORS, Roskilde University, Geography 02.1, P.O. Box 260, Dk-4000, Roskilde, Denmark ([email protected])

Abstract

Landscape and culture are among the topics that make a place attractive for tourists. Protected areas, used also for leisure purposes, represent good development opportunities for the neighbouring communities. The National Park of Greenland has adopted new regulations and leisure activities will be allowed in its area. This will represent an opportunity of increasing the tourism business in Ittoqqortoormiit, the adjacent community to the park, which is suffering from a difficult economic situation. This new use of the resources in the protected area may well serve as engine for growth and revitalization of the local economy that has a chronic lack of jobs and an important outmigration. In this article are presented some of the results of interviews done in 2009 with the Inuit of Ittoqqortoormiit regarding tourism. The goal of the project ‘Community-based tourism as an option for concrete, viable development in peripheral, remote places’ was to investigate how a small Inuit community, peripheral and remote, which has traditional subsistence activities, but low incomes and high unemployment rate, could seek economic alternatives in tourism.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2013 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Blackman, A., Foster, F., Hyvonen, T., Jewell, B., Kuilboer, A. and Moscardo, G.. 2004. Factors contributing to successful tourism development in peripheral regions. The Journal of Tourism Studies 15 (1): 5970.Google Scholar
Brown, F., and Hall, D.. 2000. Introduction: the paradox of peripherality. In: Brown, F., and Hall, D. (editors). Tourism in peripheral areas: case studies. Bristol: Channel View Publications.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Departementet for Indenrigsanliggender, Natur og Miljø. 2010. Workshop: National Park/Man and Biosphere Reserve. Nuuk: 20–21 May 2010. URL: http://dk.nanoq.gl/Emner/Landsstyre/Departementer/Dep,-d-,_for_indenrigsanliggender,_Natur_og_Milj%C3%B8/NaturAfd/Nationalpark/Workshop%20NP.aspxGoogle Scholar
Lewis, A., and Newsome, D.. 2003. Planning for stingray tourism at Hamelin Bay, Western Australia: the importance of stakeholder perspectives. International Journal of Tourism Research 5 (5): 331346.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Murphy, P., and Murphy, A.. 2002. Regional tourism and its economic development links for small communities. In: URL: http://www.regional.org.au/au/countrytowns/global/murphy.htm.Google Scholar
Nickels, S., Milne, S. and Wenzel, G.. 1991. Inuit perceptions of tourism development: the case of Clyde River. Baffin Island, N.W.T. Études/Inuit/Studies 15 (1): 157169.Google Scholar
Pearce, D.G. 2002. Tourism and peripherality: perspectives from Asia and the South Pacific. Tourism and Hospitality Research 3 (4): 295309.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Statistics Greenland. 2011. Statistical Yearbook. Nuuk: Self Government of Greenland.Google Scholar
Stewart, E.J., Draper, D. and Johnston, M.E.. 2005. A review of tourism research in the polar regions. Arctic 58 (4): 383394.Google Scholar