Few human activities in the Antarctic have been as consistently controversial as the question of tourism. Conservationists that see the increasing tourist numbers released each season by the International Association of Antarctic Tourist Operators (IAATO) have become increasingly concerned about the impact of the industry on the Antarctic environment. Governments are concerned about the potential interference tourism could pose for their scientific programmes. A recent series of headline making stories of cruise ships requiring rescuing have ensured that Antarctic tourism stays on the top of the agenda for the Antarctic community.
Tourism patterns are one of the easiest to measure, and therefore most reported, elements of Antarctic tourism. IAATO collates an annual overview of the previous season’s tourist numbers and predictions for the coming season. There has been substantial growth in tourism in the Antarctic from around 6,700 when collection commenced in 1992 to 32,000 in 2009. These figures only include landed passages, however, and therefore miss out on an important trend in Antarctic tourism during this time period: the increased number of cruise only passengers. Cruise‐only passengers have increased from essentially zero in 2000, to a significant minority of passengers (13,015) in 2009. This shift is expected to continue and increase in the next 10‐15 years as smaller ships are phased out and replaced with larger ships.
The increase in large ships conducting Antarctic tourism operations could be expected to lead to a benefit in terms of the environmental impact per capita, as larger ships (>500) are not permitted to undertake landings under current regulations, and tend to spend a shorter period of time in Antarctic waters. However, there are also additional risks involved. Where smaller ships can be assisted by one or two similarly sized vessels when they faced difficulties, larger ships would require a substantial proportion of the existing Antarctic fleet to assist in evacuation or require assistance from the South American continent, which could take days. As the burden for search and rescue operations tends to fall on the closest party to an event, the increase in tourism to Antarctica places significant risk on the national science programmes, who are likely to be incorporated into rescue efforts.
While cruise‐based tourism is by far the fastest growing sector of Antarctic tourism, small niche‐tourism enterprises are starting to increase and raise concern. Extreme adventure activities have been established in Antarctica since 1985, with some operators now offering skiing trips to the South Pole. Independent expeditions have increased in recent years and have frequently required the assistance of national scientific program bases when they have encountered difficulties. This again has the potential to disrupt government sponsored scientific activities.
The impact that tourism has on the ‘fragile’ Antarctic environment is a central argument in calls to increase regulation of Antarctic tourism. The impacts of concern to critics are interference with the biological systems of the Antarctic through pollution, both marine and terrestrial, direct disruption, i.e. through increasing stress levels in wildlife populations at sites visited by large tourist numbers, and the introduction of alien species into the Antarctic biosphere.