Checking In with Professor James Higham

Last month the New Zealand’s government announced it was introducing legislation to parliament to strip New Zealand citizens of the right to take legal action against major climate polluters. It turns out that this was the tip of an iceberg that has important implications for climate change action in tourism. 

Why do we have a conservation estate in Aotearoa? This is a very current and very political question. It makes for divided views on the current Conservation Amendment Bill and what it means for tourism and conservation in New Zealand. 

For most people, booking a holiday is about sunshine, relaxation, and getting away from it all. But now, around the world, millions of people are making travel decisions that are deeply political - and nowhere is that more evident than in the retreat from America.

Last month my Research Assistant Yi Bian and I launched a report on Regenerative Tourism to government and industry at the Tourism Policy School Research Forum in Queenstown. Today, we are making the report publicly available - supported by today’s podcast.

Tourism is associated with travel, holidays, and fun. But tourism is also a driver of impacts that are felt unequally – and those impacts are being intensified by climate change. This is now the focus of attention among tourism scholars researching in the field of climate justice.

Our most visited places depend on ecosystems that are fragile, slow to heal and central to our collective wellbeing. So how can tourism shift from drawing on these ecosystems to actively nourishing what feeds us?

Communication technologies are redefining tourism and creating new opportunities to design and deliver immersive and regenerative visitor experiences. Our current research programme is now exploring these possibilities in the South Westland Tai Poutini case study region, and benefiting enormously from a collaborative, co-design research approach.

Earlier this month the International Civil Aviation Organisation concluded its 42nd General Assembly in Montreal. The result has been another dismal failure for action on international aviation emissions and a failure for sustainable tourism. It raises the question: at what point do you accept that ICAO is incapable of dealing with aviation emissions?