A View to European Sustainable Food Tourism - Best Practices
Jauhiainen, Kaisa (2021)
2021
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Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:amk-2021120122923
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:amk-2021120122923
Tiivistelmä
The commissioner for this thesis is Hungry for Finland project, which develops Finnish food tourism and aims to make it a valuable part of the country’s tourism offering. The aim of this research is to characterize the landscape of European sustainable food tourism industry in 2021, to find what kinds of sustainable products and trends there are, as well as to find out which factors make these products sustainable.
The objective of this thesis is to offer new ideas to the commissioner and the food tourism operators in Finland on how to develop Finnish food tourism to be more sustainable. The commission was given in November of 2020 and the research was finished in November 2021.
The theoretical framework defines food tourism as a phenomenon and looks at it from the perspective of trends, motivators, and experience. European and Finnish food tourism brands are also introduced. Furthermore, sustainability as a concept and what it means in the context of traveling and food tourism is discussed.
For this thesis a qualitative study was conducted, by using nonparticipant observation as the data collecting method. The data was analysed by using an observation table as a tool for summarizing, and by conducting a thematic analysis. The sample consisted of 20 food tourism products located in different parts of Europe, that all claimed to implement sustainability in their actions.
It was found that many of the food tourism operators are paying attention to their sustainability. Implementations from all three aspects of sustainability could be found within the data; social, economic, and environmental. The sustainability trends found in the research were also in line with the trends listed in the theoretical framework.
Sustainability was communicated to the consumers by using words that demonstrate environmentally, socially and/or economically productive actions, visualized with green colour, pictures of nature, fresh food and happy looking people.
While it was found that many food tourism products are now designed with sustainability in mind, during the research it also appeared that there are still many products in the market, that do not mention anything about sustainability in their product descriptions. As the world is facing a climate crisis and starting to recover after a global pandemic, it is essential that the food tourism industry alongside other tourism, keeps on moving to a more sustainable direction.
The objective of this thesis is to offer new ideas to the commissioner and the food tourism operators in Finland on how to develop Finnish food tourism to be more sustainable. The commission was given in November of 2020 and the research was finished in November 2021.
The theoretical framework defines food tourism as a phenomenon and looks at it from the perspective of trends, motivators, and experience. European and Finnish food tourism brands are also introduced. Furthermore, sustainability as a concept and what it means in the context of traveling and food tourism is discussed.
For this thesis a qualitative study was conducted, by using nonparticipant observation as the data collecting method. The data was analysed by using an observation table as a tool for summarizing, and by conducting a thematic analysis. The sample consisted of 20 food tourism products located in different parts of Europe, that all claimed to implement sustainability in their actions.
It was found that many of the food tourism operators are paying attention to their sustainability. Implementations from all three aspects of sustainability could be found within the data; social, economic, and environmental. The sustainability trends found in the research were also in line with the trends listed in the theoretical framework.
Sustainability was communicated to the consumers by using words that demonstrate environmentally, socially and/or economically productive actions, visualized with green colour, pictures of nature, fresh food and happy looking people.
While it was found that many food tourism products are now designed with sustainability in mind, during the research it also appeared that there are still many products in the market, that do not mention anything about sustainability in their product descriptions. As the world is facing a climate crisis and starting to recover after a global pandemic, it is essential that the food tourism industry alongside other tourism, keeps on moving to a more sustainable direction.