Using tourism expenditure to understand the municipal solid waste generation: application to tourist destinations of Tenerife islands
Location
Gran Canaria
Participation
Attend the conference at Gran Canaria in person.
Type of Submission
Paper Presentation
Short Abstract
The main objective of this paper is to upgrade the methodologies that estimate tourism’s contribution to waste generation. To do this, we overcome the limitations of using quantitative variables, such as tourist numbers, introducing tourism expenditure to capture consumption patterns and the influence of tourism quality variables. In doing so, this paper provides two contributions to the literature. First, we use tourist expenditure with a high disaggregation level: i) where it occurs (in the accommodation or other services at the destination) and, ii) who makes it (tourists staying at hotels or apartments). And second, unlike other studies, our analysis is implemented at the municipal level, which provides additional insights into the weakness of current waste fees in the context of economic incentives designed to internalize municipal externalities. Results show that the waste impact of the accommodation sector using tourist expenditure is lower than the one obtained using tourist quantity variables. Moreover, tourist expenditure on services outside accommodation establishments has a greater impact on mixed waste generation than the expenditure made on accommodation and food services. There are several policy implications of these results, proposals range from charging hotels higher fees than apartments to distributing mixed waste generation costs among the different tourist activities.
Using tourism expenditure to understand the municipal solid waste generation: application to tourist destinations of Tenerife islands
Gran Canaria
The main objective of this paper is to upgrade the methodologies that estimate tourism’s contribution to waste generation. To do this, we overcome the limitations of using quantitative variables, such as tourist numbers, introducing tourism expenditure to capture consumption patterns and the influence of tourism quality variables. In doing so, this paper provides two contributions to the literature. First, we use tourist expenditure with a high disaggregation level: i) where it occurs (in the accommodation or other services at the destination) and, ii) who makes it (tourists staying at hotels or apartments). And second, unlike other studies, our analysis is implemented at the municipal level, which provides additional insights into the weakness of current waste fees in the context of economic incentives designed to internalize municipal externalities. Results show that the waste impact of the accommodation sector using tourist expenditure is lower than the one obtained using tourist quantity variables. Moreover, tourist expenditure on services outside accommodation establishments has a greater impact on mixed waste generation than the expenditure made on accommodation and food services. There are several policy implications of these results, proposals range from charging hotels higher fees than apartments to distributing mixed waste generation costs among the different tourist activities.
https://docs.lib.purdue.edu/itsa/ITSA2022/ITSA2022/76