Summary in English:

  • The campaign has met with considerable opposition, especially from tourist-heavy areas such as Northern Norway and Western Norway, who fear that increased tourism will be devastating both economically and for nature.
  • The critics are concerned that the campaign will lead to increased unregulated traffic and camping, and that it will have negative consequences for commercial tourism.
  • Innovation Norway has paused the campaign in order to take the feedback seriously and invite a new dialogue about how the problems can be solved.
  • Although work on the campaign has been ongoing for two years, it is still in its early stages, and not much money will be lost as a result of the hiatus
  • Innovation Norway hopes that the campaign can be relaunched in the future.

https://www.nrk.no/vestland/kraftige-protestar-mot-reklamekampanje-for-a-lokka-friluftslivturistar-til-noreg-1.17017078

by Lillevik_Lofoten

4 comments

  1. In generic terms: continuous tourism literally wears the environment out. For Norway: when more and more people start creating more and more their own path in the untouched nature.. it won’t be untouched. So paths need to be made, rules need to be set and limitations will apply on where, how and what during a stay. So I think the approach to figure out how to deal with the higher strain from tourism makes sense before you can add Norway to the list of countries that are damaged and worn out by tourism.

    From a personal experience: it is nothing like Iceland yet, with queues and traffic jams near the popular Instagrammable locations, but it does look like it’s busier than ever.

  2. It’s difficult to get get a halfway accurate estimate of how much tourism contributes to the GDP of different countries, because different sources throw around vastly different numbers (sometimes twice or half of what other sources cite), but most agree that Norway is not a country heavily reliant on tourism. Certainly not to the extent that the likes of Croatia, the Seychelles, or even France, Germany and the UK are.

    If you limit tourism to destinations heavily reliant on it there is a potential of risking the livelihoods of a lot of people that are dependent on it, but with a country like Norway that derives most of its highly developed economy from other sources the economic impact will be small(er). I guess prioritising the protection of the environment is a viable option there.

  3. Good. Marketing Norway with their fjords and nature is easy, but I hope there will be a bigger perspective on tourism as a whole than just the marketing part of the country. Everything from infrastructure, to how to give information about the mountain code/how to behave

    But also the questions about tourist tax, freedom of roam for tourists, cruise ships and ‘cowboy’ travel guides ect.

  4. As an American who travels to Norway whenever I can, I agree that once the word gets out, the country will be doomed. I will do my part and stop telling people they should visit.

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