The impact of climate change risk of beach loss on tourist behaviour: a review

Climate change is expected to have important effects on the tourism industry, both on the supply and demand. This article conducts a systematic search and meta-analysis of peer-reviewed research articles published in the last twenty years (2000-2019), addressing the topic of Climate Change risk of beach reduction and its relation to tourist behaviour - destination choice, willingness to re-visit, expenditure and willingness to pay for climate-related policies. The search counts for 19 papers providing a priori useful data to identify transferable economic values.

The conclusion of the meta-evaluation is that greater multidisciplinary methods are needed. The available data does not deal with all the potential impacts resulting from beach alterations due to CC, unsuitable for an integrated approach to risk assessment on tourist behaviour. Among the available socio-economic impacts the ones usable in a value transfer context are related to willingness to pay and tourism expenditure. Finally, findings confirm that the economic impacts of this environmental threat would imply large reductions in the number of tourists visiting tourist destinations and relevant amount of monetary damages.