City of Dubrovnik

For many years the city of Dubrovnik has been a leading destination in the Mediterranean. It is known for its historical old town, a UNESCO World Heritage site, and as one of the most picturesque walled cities in the world. As in many of Europe’s most prominent tourist cities however, increasing visitor numbers have led to problems with overtourism, to the point that UNESCO warned that Dubrovnik’s world heritage status was at risk. In order to cope with the limited capacity and resources, the city launched ‘’Respect the City’’ project in 2017 to make tourism more sustainable, including limiting the number of cruise ships calling at the port and the number of visitors entering the city. The economy in Dubrovnik gives 17% out of total GDP per capita (10.949,00 EUR) to tourism and related industries. Furthermore, the City of Dubrovnik is the second wealthiest city in Croatia after capital Zagreb, but also holds country’s second largest City budget. All these economical positive trends derive mostly due to growth of tourism related activities which, on the other hand, endanger the City’s natural and cultural resources. As far as the employment goes, less than 4% people are unemployed, while over 70% of population are employed in tourism and related industries. The year 2019 was a record year in terms of tourism revenue for Dubrovnik, which recorded a rise of 13 percent in arrivals and 6 percent in overnight stays in comparison to 2018. The large increase in visitor numbers can be directly linked to changes within the travel sector; combination of low-cost flights, Airbnb’s, cruise ships, and the Game of Thrones filming location, but also the cruise tourism in particular. From a socio-cultural perspective, tourism is affecting the living heritage of the city which resulted in the appearance of a turbulent relationship with the local community. Overcrowding of ports, streets and tourist attractions plus all the tourist’s activities which cause littering, vandalism, lack of respect towards attractions, rose the anti-tourist opinions within local community and forced City authorities to finally start seeking sustainable measures in addressing over-tourism. Moreover, the overwhelming volume of visitors caused the shift of Dubrovnik’s local community, primarily due to increased living costs. People were forced to find alternative and more affordable living locations, and consequently, today there are only 1,157 residents living within the city’s historic centre, significantly less than the 5,000 inhabitants level of 1991. The local business, like small manufacturers or authentic crafts, also left the premises of the Old town, due to the significant increase in rents of the exhibiting spaces/locations where they performed their business. It is in this context, that the city launched the aforementioned “Respect the City” project. Some of the measures implemented through the project include: introducing IT tools for managing crowds (surveillance cameras to control the number of visitors entering and leaving the city), restrictions in numbers of cruise ship tourists, reducing the number of souvenir stands number of restaurant tables and chairs, introduction of WiFi and smartphone apps to inform users of crowded areas in the city, etc. However, for long term measures and bolder actions, a stronger participatory processes is needed among city stakeholders to accelerate the transition to a sustainable model of tourism.