Habits of conservation, consumption and recycling are important determinants of economic
throughput. Provincial governments interested in tourism's role in a diverse, steady-state
economy may wish to orient tourism development around the tourist segments with less
intensive consumption habits. We estimate consumption of energy and materials by
tourists vacationing in Val di Merse, a rural region of Tuscany, Italy. We compare tourists
and their host population by means of a consumption based indicator, the Ecological
Footprint.