Countryside Alliance - love the countryside

The UK tourism market is made up of domestic and foreign tourism, each with different requirements and demands. According to the Countryside Agency, UK residents themselves make 30 million ‘trips' (of varying duration) into the British countryside. Whilst the countryside is used by domestic tourists for short breaks, with most people going abroad for their main holiday, there is some evidence that more UK residents in the higher socio- economic groups are choosing the UK for main or second holidays - this trend being partly accompanied by the rise in holiday home ownership. Important tourist activities include hiking/walking, swimming, visiting heritage attractions, theme parks, cycling, sailing, fishing, nature, horse riding, shooting, falconry, hunting, mountaineering and rock climbing.

policy recommendations

• Explicit sustainable tourism strategies must be devised and implemented to ensure the quality of the landscape and its biodiversity are all conserved, particularly in ‘honeypot’ areas such as the Peak District, the Dales, the New Forest, and the Lake District.

• Planning policies need to be reformed to facilitate diversification in rural areas, such as enabling redundant farm buildings to be converted for tourism use.

• National Parks and other areas with high status designations should be able to charge for entry – with any profit ring-fenced to further enhance the park, prevent or redress landscape degradation, and provide better year-round amenities for local residents and businesses to help offset the problems of commercial seasonality.

• Local tourist operators should be encouraged to source locally and to promote local produce. Farmers’ markets, farm shops and country shows are all potential visitor amenities and need to be promoted more assiduously and methodically.

• Reductions in business rates and other fiscal measures are needed to promote the long-term sustainability of the industry, since the majority of rural tourism businesses are seasonal, small and fragmented and are therefore vulnerable.