Preliminary assessment of tourists interest for tourism-tailored climate and environmental products

Despite the strong relationship between tourism and weather/climate and the sustained research in the area, little climate and environmental information customized for tourism is easily accessible for tourists. Several aspects may be considered as possible explanations, as for example tourists satisfaction with the current products and less interest for other new ones, availability, costs, efficiency in providing and delivering of new products and services to tourists etc.

We aim to identify some characteristics of a potential climate service of interest for tourists that may contribute to a better user uptake, by addressing in particular three aspects: (1) which are the weather, climate and/or environmental features most commonly marked ‘of interest’ in the general case of ‘any destination type’ and for the particular case of rural destinations; (2) which are the delivery and presentation forms of greatest interest for tourists; (3) how willing would be the tourists to pay for such information/service.

To this end, we used a questionnaire with 5 closed questions regarding the aspects mentioned before; four questions involve a five-fold Likert -type scale, while one is a multiple-choice question. The questionnaire was available online and disseminated through social media and e-mail.

The results confirm some expectations based on scientific literature like the interest for air quality and highlight the user interest for information encompassing several climate and/or environmental aspects preferably in one single product, like the thermal comfort, weather fit for outdoor activities, air quality. The survey also highlighted that mobile phone application would be the preferred mean of access, while the information should be presented in graphical form and preferably associated with some descriptive text. The financial attractivity of such information is quite low, as most of the respondents would not pay for such information and only 30% would agree to one single payment for a broader package.