Climate Change Acknowledgement and Adaptation and Mitigation Responses in Rural Tourism Destinations

From the point of view of the tourism sector, scientific research on the current changes in the climate and their impact on the sector is of key importance for the design and development of effective policies for adaptation and mitigation. However, although scientific data are essential, a complete picture cannot be gained without finding out more about the attitudes and beliefs of the people affected by these changes and their perceptions of the risk they involve. In the tourism sector, the study of risk perception associated with climate change has emerged in recent years as a subject of great interest due to its influence on the people working in the industry sand, consequently, on their ability to respond to the phenomenon, either through the adoption of strategies that can modulate its effects or through the adoption of strategies for reducing greenhouse gases emissions. Determining the perception of the risk associated with climate change, the local responses to this environmental challenge, and the barriers that hinder local capacities for adaptation and mitigation is essential for the adequate planning and management of tourist destinations. The COVID-19 crisis has taught the tourism sector several surprising lessons about the effects of global change and the urgent need to respond to the ongoing climate crisis, with impacts on the sector that are potentially far worse than those caused by the pandemic. The current situation offers us an opportunity to promote the adaptation and decarbonization of tourism in rural area, an objective which, in the new post-pandemic scenario, has taken on real importance. Based on a mixed methodology that combines a quantitative and qualitative approach, this paper explores the perception of risk associated with climate change manifested by key stakeholders in rural tourism in Catalonia. The proposed approach sheds light on their perceptions of the impacts of climate change, its possible repercussions on rural tourism businesses and the local responses of adaptation and mitigation put into practice so far. The research also identifies certain subjective barriers to adaptation that might hinder the fight against climate change. It shows that the stakeholders studied are aware of the climate change issue, its origins and consequences, and can identify evidence of its effects in their local environment that may have considerable repercussions on the preservation of current landscapes and the productive activities that they sustain. Both these circumstances have raised stakeholders’ awareness of the climate change phenomenon and are matters of interest and concern. We observed significant differences between the perceptions and responses of stakeholders who are totally or partially involved in the primary sector of the economy (i.e. owners of farms and owners of agritourism establishments) and those who are not directly involved (i.e. owners of rural tourism establishments), in that the first group were more observant of, and more sensitive to, the changes taking place around them. It seems that those who have a symbiotic relationship with nature are more predisposed to identifying the results of climate change, a finding that reflects the links between people’s perception of risk and the sociocultural and economic context in which they live.