How should Sweden handle the boom of climate tourists?

The British tourist gets almost full of laughter when she tells.

– When you enter the address where you are going and choose to go, there will be a warning sign that says you should not walk, she tells British Times Radio.

The scene is from the Greek capital Athens from last year, but it might as well have been from Portugal or Spain now. Although summer has barely begun, temperatures have shot up toward 40 degrees in parts of the countries. In large parts of the Mediterranean region there is drought, with great fire risk as a result. EU has sent out 650 firefighters To prepare the countries for what is expected to be another very tough fire season.

It is simply dangerous to be outdoors.

The Mediterranean region Has been identified as a « hotspot » for the climate change by the UN Climate Panel IPCC, and it is becoming increasingly clear why. Also Water temperatures have risen sharplywhich in turn also drives worse extreme weather as the catastrophic flood in Valencia last fall.

But the increasingly worse heat has not only consequences for the countries at the bottom of southern Europe – it also affects us here in the north, in a perhaps unexpected way.

Already in the huge investigation « Sweden faces climate change – threats and opportunities » From 2007 you saw what was on the way: an upcoming tourist boom in the north, in the climate change – partly as a consequence of Sweden’s summers getting longer and the bathing temperatures warmer, but perhaps even more as a consequence of what happens around the Mediterranean.

« Much indicates that summer tourism on the Mediterranean will be hit hard, » the investigators wrote – to see the opportunities for Sweden in the next breath. If only 1 percent of Mediterranean tourism moves to Sweden, tourism here can be doubled, according to the investigators.

« It would, calculated today’s revenue for housing, correspond to close to SEK 30 billion/year calculated in today’s monetary value, anything but the accommodation counted, » they wrote.

The investigation has 18 years on the neck – but now we are starting to see the divination become a reality. Last summer wrote media in The whole country If Europeans who went to Sweden on a « coolcation », such as the phenomenon of tourists fleeing heat is now starting to be called. At the same time reports the tourism industry How tourists choose the Mediterranean, because of the heat.

Brilliant news for Sweden. Or?

Maybe not just. Climate change also means that Sweden is facing water shortages in several parts of the country. Right now is SGU’s map of groundwater levels in Sweden Alarming red. Several of the areas where the situation is at its worst, as along the coast of Skåne, on the east coast and on Gotland and ÖlandThe upcoming tourist boom is also expected to be greatest. How should that equation go together?

And what would a tourist boom around the Baltic Sea really mean for the inner sea’s own health? The Baltic Waters Foundation, which works to protect the Baltic Sea, recently warned for the development in a debate article in the newspaper Altinget.

« How should we take advantage of the possibilities of tourism without the expense of the Baltic Sea’s well -being? », They ask themselves.

It can be thought of, when the heat of the Mediterranean gives increasingly clinging to the Swedish tourism industry’s cash register.

Read more:

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Risk of water shortage this summer – then you are affected

Peter Alestig: Rugged timing with the glacier collapse and the German case