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Christophe de Bruyn talks about Over-tourism at the Annual ISHC Conference

Within the framework of the Annual Conference of the ISHC (International Society of Hospitality Consultants) at Vienna Christophe de Bruyn, CEO of THR and member of the ISCH, had the opportunity to share his thoughts on over-tourism in one of the panels organized during the event, accompanied by Norbert Kettner, CEO of the Vienna Tourism Board and Susanne Kraus-Winkler, president of Austrian Professional Hotel Association. The panel was moderated by Tea Ros, ISHC Managing Director, Strategic Hotel Consulting.

During his participation, he spoke from an international practice and outlined the Barcelona city case.


Las Ramblas, Barcelona (Photo by Carl Court).

He also highlighted some of the factors that produce over-tourism in the different destinations, the impacts that it has on the territory, its resources and the local society; as well as some measures to prevent or mitigate it, such as setting a top limit - carrying capacity, access restrictions, price policies, etc. “It’s necessary to create multiple stakeholders’ councils or similar, integrating public-private-civil society, to discuss and take joint decisions” said De Bruyn.

“It is all about over-tourism, unbalanced tourism, or lack of tourism management?” he added reflectively to conclude his participation and stated that it is about tourism management.