European nautical tourists: exploring destination image perceptions

Purpose – Nautical tourism is considered to be an under-exploited research area, if we take into account its evolution and growth prospects. This lack of knowledge is probably one of the main reasons the sector has not reached its maximum. The present paper aims at exploring the European nautical tourists´ perceptions of image, in relation to the type of nautical sport they carry out and the type of nautical destination they visit. Methodology – The research was conducted in the Canary Islands and Morocco during 2013 and 2014. The sample covered 433 European nautical tourists pursuing different nautical sports and was organised into two groups. Structured questionnaires with personal interviews were implemented. Choosing a mature nautical destination and an emerging one enriched the comparative approach for the study. The findings indicate there are clearly similar profiles amongst the groups of tourists visiting both regions, and that the perceived image varies between a nautical tourist doing sailing and a nautical tourist motivated by other nautical sports. The data analysis reveals that perceptions also vary according to the more intensive and extensive use of the destinations. Originality – This empirical study provides useful insights into the demand for nautical tourism, the perceptions and evaluations of the ports and marinas as well as the destinations themselves, which can be used as a guide for the tourism industry managers and the Government Authorities to develop more effective marketing and positioning strategies. The study of the destination image in nautical tourism is a contribution to the progress beyond the state of the sector

Are rural residents willing to trade-off higher noise for lower air pollution? Evidence from revealed preferences

The rise in urbanization has led to an expansion of traditional urban externalities toward suburban and rural areas together with changes in the preferences of human populations for noise and air pollution. This paper analyses the preferences of the population living in rural, suburban and urban areas for noise and air pollution utilizing a revealed preference approach. Data on actual choices of residential location are analysed utilizing a Latent Class Discrete Choice model that raises two different groups of residents with different preferences for air and noise pollution. As expected and confirmed by the Multinomial and Mixed Logit models, the first group of the Latent Class model accepts higher levels of noise and air pollution in urban than in suburban and rural areas. However, the second group of residents have preferences for higher levels of noise and lower levels of air pollution in rural and suburban than in urban areas. Thus, results show some rural residents are willing to trade higher levels of noise for lower levels of air pollution, indicating adaptation of preferences to a lower level of the traditional tranquillity enjoyed in less densely populated rural areas

The Effect of the Universal Child Care Cash Benefit on Female Labour Supply in Spain

The aim of this paper is to measure the potential and real effect of universal child care cash benefit schemes on female labour supply. This subsidy, which was considered ground-breaking due to the fact that it was available to all, was introduced through the Spanish Government Act 35/2007 (BOE, 2007) and was in effect until 2010. Known as the "baby bonus", this subsidy of €2,500 per child born aimed to increase the birth rate in Spain. The introduction of this family policy provides a unique setting for a quasi-experiment, using semi-parametric DiD analysis and individual panel data sourced from the EU-SILC dataset. The results provide evidence of the positive effect of a cash-for-care subsidy that reduces the costs of a new child and increases female labour supply

Highlights of consumption and satisfaction in nautical tourism. A comparative study of visitors to the Canary Islands and Morocco

Nautical tourism is considered to be an under-exploited research area, taking into account its evolution and growth prospects. The present study was conducted with nautical tourists during their visit to the Canary Islands and Morocco between 2013 and 2014. Our aim is to better guide the creation of new joint businesses by determining the most demanded activities among the nautical tourists that visit this part of the world. Some findings indicate that tourists’ consumption and satisfaction vary between a nautical tourist that sails and a tourist motivated by other nautical activities, regardless of the destination they choose. The study also differentiates the nautical tourists’ preferences according to the most popular activities carried out at the destinations they are visiting, highlighting the role that resources such as “sea” and “nature” play as the main tourists’ motivations behind the trip. Finally, the results also reveal which elements of the nautical tourism products and services in offer are the current destinations’ weaknesses, according to the nautical tourists

Climate change, coastal tourism, and impact chains – a literature review

Climate change impacts tourism, since both supply and demand of tourism services depend on the quality and the management of a set of environmental attributes. This paper critically reviews the empirical evidence in the literature of the last twenty years (2000–2019), by identifying the potential impacts of climate change in coastal and maritime destinations. The concept of Impact Chains is the methodological framework through which the literature is systematically selected, classified and assessed. A great heterogeneity of results is found, with estimates of physical and socio-economic impacts of climate change differing across destinations and methodologies. Moreover, the majority of recent studies mainly deals with only a few of the most important impacts, hence future research should be re-directed to overlooked indicators and relationships, which are key for designing effective climate policies at tourism destinations

Apophis planetary defense campaign

We describe results of a planetary defense exercise conducted during the close approach to Earth by the near-Earth asteroid (99942) Apophis during 2020 December–2021 March. The planetary defense community has been conducting observational campaigns since 2017 to test the operational readiness of the global planetary defense capabilities. These community-led global exercises were carried out with the support of NASA's Planetary Defense Coordination Office and the International Asteroid Warning Network. The Apophis campaign is the third in our series of planetary defense exercises. The goal of this campaign was to recover, track, and characterize Apophis as a potential impactor to exercise the planetary defense system including observations, hypothetical risk assessment and risk prediction, and hazard communication. Based on the campaign results, we present lessons learned about our ability to observe and model a potential impactor. Data products derived from astrometric observations were available for inclusion in our risk assessment model almost immediately, allowing real-time updates to the impact probability calculation and possible impact locations. An early NEOWISE diameter measurement provided a significant improvement in the uncertainty on the range of hypothetical impact outcomes. The availability of different characterization methods such as photometry, spectroscopy, and radar provided robustness to our ability to assess the potential impact risk

National trends in total cholesterol obscure heterogeneous changes in HDL and non-HDL cholesterol and total-to-HDL cholesterol ratio : a pooled analysis of 458 population-based studies in Asian and Western countries

Background: Although high-density lipoprotein (HDL) and non-HDL cholesterol have opposite associations with coronary heart disease, multi-country reports of lipid trends only use total cholesterol (TC). Our aim was to compare trends in total, HDL and nonHDL cholesterol and the total-to-HDL cholesterol ratio in Asian and Western countries. Methods: We pooled 458 population-based studies with 82.1 million participants in 23 Asian and Western countries. We estimated changes in mean total, HDL and non-HDL cholesterol and mean total-to-HDL cholesterol ratio by country, sex and age group. Results: Since similar to 1980, mean TC increased in Asian countries. In Japan and South Korea, the TC rise was due to rising HDL cholesterol, which increased by up to 0.17 mmol/L per decade in Japanese women; in China, it was due to rising non-HDL cholesterol. TC declined in Western countries, except in Polish men. The decline was largest in Finland and Norway, at similar to 0.4 mmol/L per decade. The decline in TC in most Western countries was the net effect of an increase in HDL cholesterol and a decline in non-HDL cholesterol, with the HDL cholesterol increase largest in New Zealand and Switzerland. Mean total-to-HDL cholesterol ratio declined in Japan, South Korea and most Western countries, by as much as similar to 0.7 per decade in Swiss men (equivalent to similar to 26% decline in coronary heart disease risk per decade). The ratio increased in China. Conclusions: HDL cholesterol has risen and the total-to-HDL cholesterol ratio has declined in many Western countries, Japan and South Korea, with only a weak correlation with changes in TC or non-HDL cholesterol.Peer reviewe

Contributions of mean and shape of blood pressure distribution to worldwide trends and variations in raised blood pressure: A pooled analysis of 1018 population-based measurement studies with 88.6 million participants

© The Author(s) 2018. Background: Change in the prevalence of raised blood pressure could be due to both shifts in the entire distribution of blood pressure (representing the combined effects of public health interventions and secular trends) and changes in its high-blood-pressure tail (representing successful clinical interventions to control blood pressure in the hypertensive population). Our aim was to quantify the contributions of these two phenomena to the worldwide trends in the prevalence of raised blood pressure. Methods: We pooled 1018 population-based studies with blood pressure measurements on 88.6 million participants from 1985 to 2016. We first calculated mean systolic blood pressure (SBP), mean diastolic blood pressure (DBP) and prevalence of raised blood pressure by sex and 10-year age group from 20-29 years to 70-79 years in each study, taking into account complex survey design and survey sample weights, where relevant. We used a linear mixed effect model to quantify the association between (probittransformed) prevalence of raised blood pressure and age-group- and sex-specific mean blood pressure. We calculated the contributions of change in mean SBP and DBP, and of change in the prevalence-mean association, to the change in prevalence of raised blood pressure. Results: In 2005-16, at the same level of population mean SBP and DBP, men and women in South Asia and in Central Asia, the Middle East and North Africa would have the highest prevalence of raised blood pressure, and men and women in the highincome Asia Pacific and high-income Western regions would have the lowest. In most region-sex-age groups where the prevalence of raised blood pressure declined, one half or more of the decline was due to the decline in mean blood pressure. Where prevalence of raised blood pressure has increased, the change was entirely driven by increasing mean blood pressure, offset partly by the change in the prevalence-mean association. Conclusions: Change in mean blood pressure is the main driver of the worldwide change in the prevalence of raised blood pressure, but change in the high-blood-pressure tail of the distribution has also contributed to the change in prevalence, especially in older age groups

Measuring the Impact of Infectious Diseases on Tourists’ Willingness to Pay to Visit Island Destinations

The occurrence of infectious diseases may change tourists’ perceptions of a destination’s image and value. This article proposes and empirically tests a choice model to measure the effect of the risk of infectious disease outbreaks caused by climate change on tourists’ willingness to pay for holidays to island destinations. With this aim, an online survey was administrated to 2538 European frequent travellers at their country of residence. Tourists were presented with a hypothetical situation whereby they had to choose among eleven well-known European island destinations for their next holiday. The choice cards included the probability of the occurrence of infectious disease events in the context of other potential risks caused by climate change (i.e., forest fires, floods, heat waves, etc.). The results show infectious disease is the risk that more negatively affects tourists’ willingness to pay to visit islands, followed by forest fires. The results have implications for tourism policy, highlighting the importance of prevention and response strategies, and the design of climate-oriented services, which may raise opportunities to work towards the enhancement of those health and environmental conditions of tourist destinations that ensure their sustainability in the longer term