Tourism and climate change in Africa: informing sector responses

Abstract

Informing Africa’s tourism sector responses to the IPCC-AR6’s projected climate change impacts remains paramount. This study reviews the evolution of knowledge on climate change and tourism in Africa, examining gaps, scholarship trends and policy issues since the IPCC-AR5 in 2014. The Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guideline is used to gather and synthesise the relevant literature. The study observed increased tourism climate change risks, including higher temperatures, more severe droughts and floods, sea level rise, snow melting, coral bleaching and more frequent tropical cyclones. While knowledge of the impacts of climate change on tourism has increased, critical sector gaps remain in some regions and thematic areas. The study, therefore, makes a modest contribution to the literature on tourism and climate change in Africa.

Keywords:

• climate crisis
• tourism
• Africa
• carbon risk
• extreme weather
• NetZero

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

K. Dube

Kaitano Dube is an Associate of Professor of Tourism Geography and a National Research Foundation (NRF) rated researcher at Vaal University of Technology in South Africa. His research interests covers, tourism ,aviation and climate change.

G. Nhamo

Godwell Nhamo is a Full Professor and Exxaro Chair in Climate and Sustainability Transitions at the University of South Africa. He is an NRF C1 rated researcher in the fields of Sustainable Development, Disaster Risk Reduction and Climate Change Governance, and has published widely in these areas. Prof Nhamo has published 18 books (13 edited and 5 coauthored), over 105 journal articles and many book chapters. Since 2013, Prof Nhamo has graduated 13 PhDs and is currently supervising 4 others.

H. Kilungu

Halima Kilungu is a lecturer at the Open University of Tanzania in the department of Geography, Tourism and Hospitality in Tanzania. She is also the Head of this department. Her areas of research interest include wildlife ecology, water and wetlands, climate change, biodiversity, tourism, ecosystems and ecosystem services.

W. L. Hambira

Wame L. Hambira is an Associate Professor of Environmental Management at the Botswana University of Agriculture and Natural Resources in Botswana. Her research work is centred on global environment change and its socio-economic impacts particularly on the tourism and agricultural sectors.

E. A. El-Masry

Esraa El-Masry is a Lecturer of Marine Geology, Oceanography Department, Facultyof Science, Alexandria University, Egypt. Her research interests are Climate Change and its impacts on coastal zone. El-Masry is a specialist in Remote Sensing and Geographic Information System and their applications on assessing the Coastal Change.

D. Chikodzi

David Chikodzi is a Postdoctoral research fellow in the Institute for Corporate Citizenship, University of South Africa. His research interests include sustainable livelihoods, climate change, tourism, water resources management and disaster risk reduction.

L. Chapungu

Lazarus Chapungu is a Postdoctoral fellow in the Institute for Corporate Citizenship, University of South Africa. His areas of research interest include climate change, biodiversity, tourism, COVID-19 and Sustainable development.

E. L. Molua

EL Molua is an environmental researcher from University of Buea, Buea, SW Region, Cameroon. He has held several senior positions and is an international academic.