Tourism climate insurance: implications and prospects

This paper investigates the intentions of tourists to purchase climate insurance as part of their holiday packages. A research model, based on Bagozzi’s reformulation of attitude theory designed to examine the relationships between climate expectation-disconfirmation and the behavioral intentions of tourists in purchasing tourism climate insurance, with destination loyalty as an outcome. The model hypothesizes and tests whether expectation-disconfirmation can be resolved by insuring the product-climate. A structural equation modeling is utilized. The results reveal that the expectation-disconfirmation of tourists in relation to climate is positively associated with their intentions to purchase insurance and negatively affects loyalty.     

The origins and functioning of the private wildfowling lease system in a major Mediterranean wetland: the Camargue (Rhone river delta, southern France)

All over the world, the demand for high-quality hunting areas has been growing in recent decades and this trend is expected to continue in the future. In the Camargue (southern France), where there are large wintering populations of ducks, the leasing of privately owned estates for wildfowling is becoming an alternative economic activity that can supplement and even exceed the income from other uses of farmland. In this region, several habitats of conservation concern, including Mediterranean seasonally flooded marshes, are managed for this purpose. However, data on wetland management for shooting and on the status of private shooting clubs in relation to local farming, are scarce. We investigated the characteristics of 42 private wildfowling clubs in the Rhone river delta. Aerial surveys were used to collect the data on land use on these sites. In addition, interviews and questionnaires allowed us to identify habitat management practices undertaken by landowners and hunting managers. We describe the origins and functioning of the private wildfowling club system. A multifactorial analysis and an ascending hierarchical classification distinguished three types of club. We evaluated leasing costs and incomes in the Camargue, their determinants, and some consequences of the leasing system on rural development and the conservation of wetlands.     

A holistic approach to land system dynamics – The Monfurado case in Alentejo,Portugal

Understanding land system dynamics is fundamental for policy-making from local to global scale. Land system is a combination of land use, land management and territorial practices. To attain such complete information about landscape structures is a challenging task. Aiming to deepen knowledge on land systems, we applied a methodology meant to achieve a broader understanding of dynamics in the Sítio de Monfurado (SM), a Natura 2000 site and holder of High Nature Value farming systems. To do so, we combined spatial analysis of land system changes with a participatory approach designated as Territory Game. While the spatial analysis shows little change in the SM land systems, the territory is perceived as fast-changing by the territorial actors (e.g., stakeholders with an explicit role in territorial development). At both scales, and in agreement with literature, we find trends of simplification and intensification in land systems, typically associated with the reduction of multifunctionality. The combination of both approaches contributed to the understanding of past changes, the drivers that induce such changes, how these are interpreted and, how to act upon them in the future. The proposed combined methodology can bring new useful insights for policy-makers, although scaling from local to broader scale remains a challenge.     

Costs of providing local public services and compact population in Spanish urbanised areas

This paper addresses the impact of land use patterns associated with compact population on the costs of provision and maintenance of urban public services for local entities, controlling for other factors. The aim is to develop an econometric analysis using a panel data set of municipalities of the Spanish Mediterranean area and Madrid in the period 2006–2014. The estimations derived from the study confirm one main hypothesis and indicate that compact population impacts positively on the decrease of municipal costs of urban public services. This study suggests that municipal planning instruments of local entities could contribute to efficiently manage their budgets, as well as orients public policy in terms of its local land use decision-making.     

Migrant Agricultural Workers in Local and Global Contexts: Toward a Better Life?

Four books published between 2013 and 2014 make a vital contribution towards understanding the political and ideological tools by which states and employers construct hyper‐exploitable agricultural workers. In this review essay, we provide an assessment of how these books have advanced our understandings of migrant farm labour regimes in local and international perspectives. After presenting a synopsis of each text, we critically reflect on key lessons learned, offer questions that merit further attention, and suggest directions for future research. Our review finds that despite wide differences in geopolitical and legal contexts in which migrant agricultural workers cross borders, live and work, there are remarkable resemblances in the ways in which states use (and abuse) migrant labour. Likewise, there are glaring similarities in the consequent vulnerabilities migrants experience. While each author provides compelling and empirically rich observations based on local fields of study, generally lacking are broader global connections and policy discussions about how the problems raised can be meaningfully addressed. Given the seeming ubiquity of exploitative migrant agricultural worker regimes, the fundamental question left largely unanswered is: Must ‘local’ agricultural systems depend on vulnerable imported workers in order to provide affordable food for consumers, or are there workable alternatives to this arrangement?     

Segmenting East Asian Tourists to Greece by Travel Motivation

This study compares the push and pull motivations of East Asian (Japanese, Chinese and Korean) tourists who visit Greece and also proposes market segmentation based on travel motivations that transcend the national boundaries of those countries. Four main push factors were identified: “Knowledge”, “Ego-enhancement”, “Escape & Relaxation” and “Novelty”. Similarly, four pull factors were also identified: “Leisure, shopping and safety”, “Variety and cost”, “Culture & heritage” and “Travel arrangements and facilities”. Cross-cultural differences were found regarding the importance of travel motivations. Chinese tourists scored higher than other nationalities for almost all motivation categories. Although the cross-cultural differences are important, this study proposes another way to tackle the market segmentation by conducting an international segmentation based on inherent similarities across different nationalities of travelers. Three segments emerged from that analysis with the “Novelty Seekers” to be the largest followed by the “Want-it-All” and the “Lowly Motivated”.     

Mediterranean charters — a comparative geographic perspective

The growth of inclusive tour charter (ITC) flights has contributed significantly to the growth of Mediterranean tourism during the 1970s and early 1980s. This article examines the demand over time for ITC flights originating from airports in the UK, FR Germany and Sweden, to destinations within Spain and Greece. Significant regional biases are found to occur in the destinations favoured by each of the three generating markets for both Spain and Greece. A more detailed analysis of the patterns and trends of intra-national variation in ITC-flight demand could be useful to decision makers within the tourism industry.     

Counting the cost of healthy eating: a Swedish comparison of Mediterranean‐style and ordinary diets

The aim of this research was to examine the cost of a diet generally regarded as healthy, a Swedish version of the Mediterranean diet, and to compare it with the cost of an ordinary Swedish diet. A total of 30 individuals provided detailed dietary data collected in a randomized intervention study, examining the effect of dietary change to a Mediterranean‐style diet in patients with rheumatoid arthritis (Mediterranean group, n = 16, control group, n = 14). The data, covering 1‐month dietary intake, were examined with three different diet quality indicators to see whether the Mediterranean group consumed a healthier diet than the control group. All diet quality indicators showed that the Mediterranean group consumed a healthier diet than the control group. Consumer food prices were used to analyse the cost of the different diets. In immediate consumer cost terms, eating a healthier diet was more expensive when differences in energy intake were discounted. However, non‐energy adjusted costs showed no significant difference between the groups. Hence, if one of the reasons for choosing a healthier diet is to achieve weight loss – by consuming less energy – it is possible that healthier eating is not more expensive.     

地中海联盟移民问题及政策研究

地中海联盟国家之间的移民问题是地中海地区的一个重要议题。从地中海南岸和东岸流向地中海北岸欧盟国家的移民数量众多,且呈现不断上升的趋势。这些移民一方面对欧盟经济发展做出了积极贡献,另一方面,也给移民接收国带来了许多社会问题。为解决地中海地区的移民问题,欧盟与地中海沿岸国家积极开展合作,形成了欧盟、地区、国家多层级的移民政策体系,但其收效并不理想。尽管如此,地中海联盟移民政策体系对中国移民政策发展仍有一定的启发意义。     

Assessing the trade impact of the European Neighbourhood Policy on the EU-MED Free Trade Area

The European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) set an additional objective for the Southern Mediterranean Countries (SMCs): the prospect of ‘a stake in the internal market’. The launch of this new policy has been the occasion for a revival of empirical studies aimed at assessing the impact of the EU-MED partnership on bilateral trade. The novelty of this work is twofold: (i) to present nonparametric matching estimators besides gravity estimates; (ii) to assume as a counterfactual of the treatment the ex-post long-run average treatment effects of the Europe Agreements. By controlling for likely selection bias and country and time heterogeneity, using both qualitative and quantitative measures of the policy variable, we assess ex-post the trade-enhancing impact of the EU preferential agreements towards SMCs and ex ante the actual efficacy of the ENP.