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Fig. 18.1 A polarized categorization of types of landscape uses from the demand side of tourism

as complex biophysical and socio-economic systems, worthy of their interest and involvement in and of themselves.

Deeper analysis and a critical approach to the complex relationship of tourism and landscape are, therefore, required, in order to pull out its strengths and weaknesses, as well as its potential and risks. Next, we will focus specifically on the different forms that this relationship may take under various agriculture conditions, in their broader local/regional socio-economic and cultural system.

18.4Tourism and Local Agricultural System

Various types of tourism landscape consumption, as described previously, relate and impact in different ways on the agricultural system, especially according to the type and intensity of agricultural use, ranging from mechanized terrace cultivation to subsistence uses and abandoned terraces. Several questions arise, in this regard: Can tourism be a solution counter terrace abandonment and decline or is it a direct cause of them? Is it even possible to recuperate abandoned and destroyed terraces through tourism? Generalising, how do different forms of tourism produce different impacts on terraced landscapes, in relation to their level of agricultural productivity? The diagram in Fig. 18.2 represents a critical approach to synthesizing the impacts of tourism on the agricultural use of the terraces.

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Fig. 18.2 Impacts of different types of tourism on the agricultural system of terraced landscapes, according to agricultural system capacity

Besides terrace demolition, agricultural mechanization might offer some solutions to terrace maintenance and, at the same time, sustenance of high—or at least competitive—levels of production. Thus, the upper part of the scheme corresponds to the productive terraces, encompassing intense cultivations, run and managed mainly for market destinations, affording enough income for farmers/entrepreneurs, so as to be their one and only occupation, as well as terraces cultivated for local consumption, through cooperative distribution or limited to individual/subsistence uses. A more specific and detailed analysis will, undoubtedly, further distinguish these typological categories of productive terraces, taking into consideration also production techniques, goals and targets.

The second (intermediate) level of agricultural use corresponds to terraces in decline, where a variety of other variables affect the stability of the production. This occurs mainly where crop yields are not especially valuable in terms of farmers’ main source of income, and thus not worthwhile for younger generations to pursue the family’s activity or to invest in new farming technologies. As in the case of the productive (previous) category, this category may also be further split or expanded into more levels and types of decline (structural, economic or social decline).

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Finally, the lowest level includes abandoned terraced landscapes, which are often found in the same geographical areas of productive or declining terraces but have been exposed to the least agriculturally favourable conditions, in order for them to continue to be profitably or sustainably exploited. These conditions may refer to the physical realm (morphology, solar irradiation, accessibility of the spot), or to the human/social realm (i.e. economic viability, funding, family characteristics, patterns of land ownership, local development strategies), as explored throughout this volume. On the basis of agricultural use levels, the diagram shows the main impacts under mass or mild tourism conditions–also implying all in-between tourism categories.

Turning now to the bottom-left corner of the diagram (abandoned terraces), we found no bibliographical evidence of any case of terrace restoration from the level of abandonment, strictly due to mass tourism. Therefore, when nearby tourism flows in areas surrounding terraced landscapes, do not consider them as a possible destination, the consequence on the terraced landscape, from the point of view of the agricultural system, is a progressive rewilding, especially in the steepest and mountainous areas. However, moving on the bottom-right part of the diagram, special-interest tourism (such as eco-tourism) has shown to have some potential in the recovery of abandoned terraces, where hiking or climbing-related activities offer incentives to clear and rebuild destroyed drystone walls.

Where agriculture on terraces is in decline, tourism may affect it either in negative or positive ways. In some Greek islands, under strained agricultural conditions, 3Ss tourism may be highly stressful to terraced landscape dynamics (Petanidou et al. 2008; Kizos and Koulouri 2006). When mass 3Ss tourism is not interested in the local culture or nature, meanwhile offering more appealing job opportunities for younger generations, vineyards, olive groves and other cultivations are often abandoned (Terkenli 2001; Tsartas 1996).

Alternative or special-interest forms of tourism might, on the contrary, offer some opportunities to farmers, boosting local and regional economies. In these cases, local farmers are often encouraged to rediscover ancient agricultural practices, and, in combination with modern ones, to provide tourists with high-quality products. Mild, adaptive and sustainable forms of tourism are preferable in these areas, where rural populations are small, services and facilities poor, and accommodations often do not satisfy mass tourism standards and demands, preventing large-scale landscape changes which might compromise ecosystem stability and local cultures survival (Du Cros and McKercher 2015, p. 187; Chan et al. 2016; UNESCO 2008).

Finally, where terraced agricultural systems are highly productive and self-sustained (providing place-based quality products), tourism may impact on the agricultural system mainly in terms of commercial dynamics and with the inclusion of other uses of the terraces along the agricultural one, such as wine and gastronomy tours or cycle tourism. In the case of mass tourism flows, there is a risk that, in order to attract greater tourism demand, terrace cultivation declines due to the dominance of agricultural mechanization and other innovations, leading to the neglect of maintenance of terraced slopes and stonewalls; in these cases, what tends

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to be valued by the tourists are the landscape products, instead of the landscape itself. Other possible impacts might be excessive commodification and banalization of terraced agriculture systems’ characteristics, products and services.

In Valtellina (Italy) for example, traditional vineyards used to be oriented perpendicularly to the terraces, while nowadays they tend to be positioned more in parallel to the terraces, to allow small machines to pass through the cultivated rows. This, of course, constitutes a transformation in the landscape, with a definitive loss, in terms of longstanding traditions and product quality (banalization), but it has allowed farmers to implement innovations and stem the decline of terraced agriculture. In addition, the presence of cycling and walking routes through vineyards allows locals to convey cultural knowledge and expose the value of their products to the tourists. In this case, it seems that agriculture and tourism can benefit from one another, operating as a system of assets which concur towards landscape sustainability. Nevertheless, Puleo (2013) warns about a possible ‘parasitic’ approach, which, on the one hand, through a process of selection and separation, involves the abandonment of terraces not productive or valuable enough, while, on the other hand, through processes of tourist exploitation, relegates the terraces to mere images, for external consumption. In this case, both tourists and tour operators grasp only the scenic dimension of the terraces, their aesthetic value and the impressive effect of the heroic work of generations—accompanied by its appropriate rhetoric—with no further or deeper impact on their knowledge about them or of actual territorial interrelations.

Each of the previous examples is paradigmatic of the main issues that are at stake when agriculture coexists with tourism on the terraces. In general, tourism often seems to conflict with agriculture on terraces, because, here, ecological, social and economic balances are extremely delicate and cannot sustain excessive crowds of visitors. When agriculture survives, it is either in the form of a residual practice, part of the exotic and nostalgic dimension of these landscapes, or it constitutes an innovative activity, as mechanized as possible, and strongly dependent on a market niche, which often uses terraces as a ‘brand’, but tends to ignore or destroy those less productive terraces, just around the corner.

18.5Tourism and the Socio-Economic System

If the impacts of tourism on agriculture affect directly the terraced landscape, the effects of tourism on the broad socio-economic system act mostly indirectly on it, altering it significantly (Fig. 18.3).

As already mentioned, tourism primarily brings about an increase in incomes and jobs, instigating their shift from other economic sectors to tourism itself. These processes occur in different ways, at different destinations, depending on the robustness of the other economic sectors, the types and characteristics of tourism promoters (insiders or outsiders; local small entrepreneurs or large tour operators), the intensity of tourist flows and the type of tourism promoted and developed. Of

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Fig. 18.3 Impacts of different types of tourism on the socio-economic system of terraced landscapes

course, when large tourist flows occur, a large shift towards employment in tourism can carry along a decrease of agricultural jobs, especially among the younger population cohorts, with the risk of consequent abandonment of agricultural practices. This is the case in the Philippine rice terraces of the Ifugao region, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, where young people easily and readily find employment in tourism, and traditional know-how of preservation and upkeep of the terraced landscape is no longer transmitted from elderly farmers to the next generations. Such trends may lead to the destruction of the terraced landscape that represents the very basis of the tourist attraction (Christ 2015). In other situations, where tourism only partially contributes to the family income, farming may maintain its importance and rural exodus may be curbed, with opposite—positive— effects on the conservation of these terraced landscapes, as already shown.

Furthermore, the direct involvement and participation of indigenous people in various tiers and posts of the local tourism industry, but especially as active investors, entrepreneurs and managers, keep tourism in local hands, which tends to recycle profits and benefits (and costs, also, of course) in the local societies, thus enhancing tourism development and/or prompting more general local and regional development. This direct involvement and control of local tourism by the local side contribute to the continuation of the traditional activities (agriculture, but also craftsmanship), which also serve and support tourism, interlinked, or even creating a multiplier effect in the local/regional economy. The same effect may be achieved