Transnational and Cross-Border Cooperation for Sustainable Tourism Development in the Baltic Sea Region

Abstract

This article highlights policy in the field of sustainable tourism development being implemented at various institutional levels with particular attention to Russia as one of the participants in this cooperation. The author of this paper examines the processes aimed at achieving sustainable development goals in tourism at each of these levels. The initial focus of this article is to investigate how the territorial cooperation programs operating in the Baltic Sea Region in 2014–2020 contributed to sustainable development of tourism. There were more than 1000 projects investigated within the research area and the author found that 155 of them contribute to sustainable tourism development. The programs with the highest number of projects are in Latvia–Russia, Poland–Russia and Lithuania–Russia. They are mostly targeted at ecotourism development (35) or historical and cognitive projects (28). This supports our hypothesis regarding the importance of cross-border cooperation programs in implementing United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

Development Prospects of Tourist Passenger Shipping in the Polish Part of the Vistula Lagoon

“…Introducing local border traffic in the border zone in 2012 was a vital impulse in the development of tourism, but it did not include sea border crossings [11][12][13][14][15]. Emphasis on developing cross-border cooperation, including water tourism, was the subject of programs of Russia-EU cooperation [7,15,16]. Nevertheless, since 2009, the access of Polish vessels to the waters of the Vistula Lagoon within Russia has been hampered by the necessity to notify of the intention to enter Russian waters at least 14 days in advance, with a possibility of refusal at any time.…”

“…Waters of the Vistula Lagoon are subject to strong eutrophication, which is not conducive to their full use for recreation. In general, the area adjacent to the lagoon is poorly invested in; it has mostly low population density and experienced many socio-economic problems in the past, such as high unemployment or insufficiently developed infrastructure [7,19,20]. The main settlement centers of the region have seaports, with the most important being Kalingrad, Baltiysk, Swetly on the Russian side, and Elbląg, Krynica Morska and Frombork on the Polish side.…”

“…Tourism is a factor initiating the socio-economic development of cross-border regions and it stimulates the strengthening of international cooperation [4][5][6][7]. The current geopolitical situation in the Vistula Lagoon region is not conducive to the development of tourism and international transport, but local activities aim at supporting the activities of the tourism industry.…”

Analysis of the Competitiveness of the Performance of Baltic Ports in the Context of Economic Sustainability

“…Not only the competitive environment, but also the importance of cross-border cooperation programs in achieving the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals is of particular importance to the countries of the Baltic Sea Region in pursuit of economic sustainability [8]. Nevertheless, the competitive environment constantly affects the performance of the Baltic Sea ports and enables the analysis of the main risk factors and the capacity of competitors.…”

Tourism SME sustainability social and economic challenges during pandemic: cases of Russian Federation, Georgia and Latvia

“…The number of publications on sustainability is considerable, the research of recent publications reveals that even in the tourism sector, the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) represent a new research frontier for scholars and the number of research articles is increasing steadily [12]. The global tourism industry has been stopped and concern about overtourism has suddenly been replaced by opposite worry undertourism that can endanger future economies and social aspects of worldwide development [9] Many scholars' studies show cooperation programs are not economically effective, still some researchers see potential for socio-economic development [13] Tourism is one of the most labour-intensive sectors of the economy, and it is among those that are most affected by the pandemic and the pandemic situation pressure is pushing on both social as well as economic sustainability [14,15].Sustainable socio-economic development as such should be based on both the economic as well as social aspects, it must consider the complex balance of incomes and outcomes of resources used [16 ]. As indicated by Skvarciany, Jureviciene, Volskyte, there are not many researchers who investigate socioeconomic development specifically from the economic perspective [17].…”