NECESSITY OF THE EARLY WARNINGS SYSTEM FOR THE DEVELOPMENT OF NEW SUSTAINABLE FORMS OF TOURISM. THE CASE OF CHIOS ISLAND, NORTH AEGEAN

摘要

Tourism is a major activity in the Greek islands and more especially in the islands of North Aegean. Its development during recent decades stopped the economic and demographic decline of the area. The paper develops a framework for the appraisal of tourism's sustainability in the Greek islands, and it is concluded that the conventional tourism model, based on sun, sea and sand (3S) has failed to promote sustainability due to the limited economic benefits for host communities and growing environmental pressures, based on the theoretical scheme of the Early Warning System, the life cycle model. The latest trend in Greece and elsewhere is a shift from mass tourism to more environmentally friendly and sustainable forms of tourism. Policies to change tourism patterns in the Greek islands will need to take into consideration their unique characteristics, their existing realities, and to be based on the exploitation of the local natural and cultural resources in order to develop new forms of tourism. The purpose of this paper is to identify the early warnings of decline of the product, identify types of new forms of tourism that are being developed in the North Aegean islands and more especially on the island of Chios, and to evaluate their impact. Various practical examples are presented, together with the difficulties involved in their implementation. The initiatives are in fact so recent that it is difficult to assess their tangible results.