THE IMPACT ON ENVIRONMENTAL SUSTAINABILITY OF CATERING FACILITIES FOR TOURISTS

Catering facilities have a significant impact on the environmental sustainability of any destination. While travelling, people waste more food, eat more and prefer environmentally less sustainable products. This unsustainable behaviour is spatially conditioned: tourists move almost exclusively within a small part of a destination (the so-called limited area) where only a limited number of catering facilities are located. These businesses are therefore the key drivers of the environmental sustainability. The main objectives of this paper are to investigate the size of the limited area, number of catering options spatially accessible to tourists and finally to assess the environmental vulnerability of 38 European destinations associated with the limited area tourists usually visit and with the number of catering facilities that are accessible for tourists. Based on the spatial analysis considering the location of catering facilities, geo-located photographs and Airbnb listings, the limited area was calculated, and four indicators were implemented to assess the environmental vulnerability. The results showed that tourists move in only 4.4 km(2) (3.3% of a city administrative boundary). In this area, millions of tourists have access to 685 catering facilities. In terms of spatial conditionality of food consumption, Venice, Amsterdam, and Florence are among the most environmentally vulnerable destinations. Furthermore, Venice and Florence also lack the environmental potential as a strong majority of catering facilities is located within their limited areas. On the contrary, Geneva and Thessaloniki were assessed as the least environmentally vulnerable destinations in our sample. Paris is the destination with the highest environmental potential, as 84% of its catering businesses are located beyond the borders of the limited area.