Aktiviteter
Nature and cultural heritage in suistainable tourism
Belén García Ovide
Belén García Ovide is a Spanish marine biologist who has dedicated the last 14 years of her life on studying and exploring the oceans. Leading several projects in ocean conservation, her work focuses on whale research, underwater acoustic, plastic pollution, environmental DNA and citizen science. Belén also works as a first officer and wildlife guide in remote places around the world, including both Arctic and Antarctic regions. In 2019, she founded Ocean Missions, a non-profit organization in Húsavík, Iceland, that aims to inspire people to protect the oceans by a combination of science, education and sailing. Currently, she is co-owner of the sailing vessel “Tilvera”, leading the Tilvera Project with his partner Heimir Hardarson and doing her PhD at the University of Iceland, and as part of the eWHALE international project.
Karen Boswarva
From Shoreline to Seabed: Stromness's Museum Without Walls
In 2019, Stromness Museum launched its first-ever Snorkel Safari, inviting the public to connect with Orkney’s rich marine life. Then during the challenges of COVID-19, the museum adopted a “Museum Without Walls” approach—taking collections outdoors and giving historical artefacts a living context by hosting outdoor events and digital trails. Since then, in partnership with Seasearch (a UK-wide citizen science project) and a local dive school, the Snorkel Safari has become an annual event. Karen Boswarva, a resident of Stromness is a marine ecologist and science communicator who coordinates Seasearch activities throughout Orkney. She is an advocate for ocean literacy, local stewardship, and positive mental health and wellbeing through connections with nature and the marine environment.
In this session, Karen will share how this innovative collaboration bridges natural history, marine tourism, heritage, and hands-on conservation to breathe new life into our local history.
Kyrre Evjenth Slind
An eider duck’s guide to growing your tourism business
In 2004, the Vega Archipelago was granted Unesco World Heritage status as a cultural landscape, with a particular emphasis on the eider duck caretaking practice and women’s crucial role in carrying on the tradition.
Over the next 20 years, the visitor tally to the small Vega community, hosting 1200 residents, doubled tenfold from 4000 to 40 000 pr. year, with the eider duck as a show star. Although only a few bird guardians invite visitors onto their tiny islets to partake in the actual eider duck work, spin off products like a 5 million € visitor’s center, outdoor activities, books, music, and cruise visits speak of a successful tourism business build on the charisma of a nesting bird.
In this presentation, Kyrre Evjenth Slind, speaks on how the common eider duck became a tourist magnet in the Vega Archipelago, and how the Vega society works and strives to benefit and develop as a tourism centered community