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MOOC Tourism and Climate Change

Global tourism’s CO2 emissions and overall environmental impact are substantial. Yet, is spite of the tourism sector’s vulnerability to the impacts of climate change, it continues to grow exponentially, driven by an ever rising tourism demand. Join Wageningen University & Research as our successful Tourism team explores the mutual impacts of tourism stakeholders and the climate. Take on our challenge of reimagining the tourism industry toward low-carbon, sustainable development! Subscribe now.

Organised by	Wageningen University & Research
Duration	5 weeks, 2-4 hours per week

Enrol now on edX®

Why follow this course?

Tourism and climate change, inextricably connected

From global warming caused by greenhouse gas emissions to ecosystem change and loss of biodiversity, from excessive precipitation to extreme droughts; the effects of climate change have become apparent around the world. Eventhough such disasters are devastating for tourism, the industry’s contribution to climate change remains formidable. And if it continues to grow as it does today, the United Nations expect tourism to be solely responsible for consuming the global yearly carbon budget by 2070, all by itself!

In turn, climate change is already affecting tourism destinations. For instance, numerous small islands and coral reefs are under threat of devastating storms and sea level rise. At the same time, we can see other parts of the world gradually turning into deserts, caused by incessant droughts as well as excessive water consumption by tourism.

Climate change adaptation and mitigation for tourism destinations

UNWTO: “The future resilience of tourism will depend on the sector’s ability to embrace a low carbon pathway and cut emissions by 50% by 2030”. In light of this, we have dedicated this online course to the key challenges tourism faces in context of drastic climate change. You will engage with fellow learners in (re-)modelling various case studies related to adaptation and mitigation. Through this exercise you'll gain a well-founded understanding of how to best engage with future tourism issues within your organisational situation. You will also learn about your own carbon footprint.

Join the debate to drive tourism's sustainability transition

The MOOC ends with a range of potential future scenarios. And you will be invited to vote, based on which the teaching staff will further equip the content of this course to best address emergent challenges. Importantly, you will be invited to join the debate platform on sustainable innovations, during and after finalisation of the course. Since there is no doubt that tourism has been greatly affected by the Covid-19 pandemic, any Corona related questions will be discussed throughout our tourism courses.

Is this course for you?

Whether you work in tourism, are a tourism related business owner or a fervent traveller, join us for this MOOC as we project onto the future what impact tourism will have, if left unaltered. Help drive sustainability in tourism! Subscribe now.

What you will learn

The relationship- and mutual impacts of- tourism and climate change
Climate change mitigation/adaptation strategies
Future challenges in tourism related to climate change
Apply lessons learned on your own/organisational situation
Reflect upon your own behaviour/calculate travel footprint/model future scenarios

Professional Certificate in Sustainable Tourism

If you find this MOOC interesting, we recommend you take also a look at our Professional Certificate Programme Tourism in Transition: Exploring a Sustainable Future, designed to take you on an wholistic investigation of the industry and eventually leading to your very own concrete envisioning of what sustainable tourism should look like. It consists of three MOOCs, the first ranked by Class Central among the 10 best online courses in the world, the second nominated for the annual edX® award in 2019: