France fears climate change could erode its appeal as the world’s top tourist destination, pointing to the risk of melting snow, water shortages and disappearing beaches in a report published this week.
Tourism makes up some six per cent of France’s gross domestic product, thanks to its sunny coast, lavender fields, ski resorts and art-rich cities, but the government report said global warming could change that.
The ministry of the economy’s tourism department based its report on expectations of a 3- to 4 C rise in temperature by 2100.
A rise in sea levels is expected to exacerbate coastal erosion, which already affects one-fifth of France’s tourist areas. Alpine ski resorts are also likely to suffer.
Under the scenario, winter sports would no longer be possible in resorts at an altitude of 1,200 metres. A 2 C rise, for example, would halve the 35 ski resorts in the Alpine region of Haute-Savoie to 18.
In summer, when tourist numbers are at their highest, water is scarce and farmers need to irrigate parched fields, the effects of climate change could be dramatic, the report said: “Will we choose to irrigate golf courses or fields of maize?”
Not only the mainland will be hurt: the palm-fringed islands that make up France’s overseas departments, such as New Caledonia and Polynesia, could lose the coral reefs that constitute their main tourist attraction, the report said.
Some 82 million tourists visited France in 2007, according to national statistics bureau INSEE, making it the world’s most popular tourist destination by numbers of visitors, but third by revenues, after the U.S. and Spain.
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