I will handle my topic “Socially, culturally and economically sustainable tourism from a cultural manager's point of view” with several examples from a project that I have recently implemented. This is why I first have to make a short introduction of the project itself.

Since June 1998, I have been working with a project, the aim of which was originally to start a new annual literature festival in a small archipelago municipality called Kustavi. In the beginning of 2001, the project changed to a steady work within an association which was newly founded in order to organise the festival, now established as an annual one.

Kustavi is situated in the northern part of the archipelago of Southwest Finland. There are only about 1000 inhabitants there, a municipal library, an elementary school and two or three shops but nothing else in the winter. In the summertime, on the other hand, hundreds of summer residents return to their summer cottages and villas, thousands of tourists arrive at Kustavi and restaurants and hotels open their doors for two or three months.

A famous Finnish writer Volter Kilpi was born in Kustavi in 1874. This means that his125th anniversary was in 1999. I will not describe his life and work in detail, but there is one thing that is worth pointing out here too: His main work, the so called Archipelago series is a central and appreciated part of Finland’s national literature, and, at the same time, it is a detailed description of the life in this part of the archipelago in the 1860’s. The central characters of the book are on one hand a group of peasant sea captains and sailors who are planning to build a new bark and on the other hand those poorer people of the parish, whose lives also are connected to the bark project in one way or another.

In 1998, people in the region acknowledged that this writer deserves a celebration on his 125th anniversary and they also realised that there was an opportunity to start a new literature festival in a region where there existed no festivals of the kind before. On the initiative of the municipality of Kustavi and the Arts Council of Southwest Finland, a project was developed, the aim of which was to start a new literature festival dedicated to the writer Volter Kilpi.

The first festival took place in July 1999 and since that it has been organised twice, in 2000 and 2001. During the first festival, Volter Kilpi was in the centre of the festival, his works were read and dramatised, excursions were made along his foot prints, popularised lectures on his life and works were held by prominent academics etc. The following years there have be new themes but, still, basing on Kilpi’s thematic. New themes, such as dialects and literature, sea and literature, women and the sea, masters of long sentences such as Proust and Joyce etc were handled in 2000 and 2001. The success of the festival has guaranteed its future: there is no doubt that the festival has become and annual one.

SUSTAINABLE TOURISM

Sustainable development is often analysed as consisting of four separate levels or elements:

1. Ecological sustainability
2. Social sustainability
3. Cultural sustainability
4. Economical sustainability

I will not handle questions of ecological sustainability. I also have difficulties to see what the essential difference between social and cultural sustainability is, at least when we are talking about socially and culturally sustainable tourism. Because it is difficult to draw a clear line between the two concepts, I will handle them as one whole: socially and culturally sustainable tourism or socio-culturally sustainable tourism.

There are some points that I consider important when talking about regional development and sustainable tourism. As I see it,

1. Development of socially and culturally sustainable tourism acts for the welfare of the people of the destination region.
2. The people of the destination region have the right to say what kind of tourism there will be in their community and in what way their home region is marketed to the tourists.
3. Development of socially and culturally sustainable tourism respects the meaning of the local culture to the local people.
4. Development of socially and culturally sustainable tourism preserves the uniqueness of the culture in the destination region and tries to avoid the dangers of similarisation.
5. The relationship between the tourists and the local people must be equal. In an ideal case tourists are guests who are politely wished welcome by the local people who are their hosts. Guests of course act politely towards the hosts and respect their customs and their home.
6. Cultural landscape is preserved.
7. The people in the destination region have the biggest deal of the income created by tourism.

As a conclusion, socially, culturally and economically sustainable tourism prioritises the local population’s needs and respects the local culture as a source of mental, social and economical well fare of the people.

HOW DO NEW FESTIVALS START?

Henry Terho has compared festivals with different starting points (Kulttuuritapahtumat osana kaupunki-imagoa: DBTL-kaupunkifestivaali (Turku) ja Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival (Englanti) kaupunki-imagojen rakentajana, seminar Studia Cultura, Turku 19.11. 1999 ). A typical start of a new cultural event or festival is the following: A few enthusiastic people decide to put up a small cultural event, for example a series of concerts or an exhibition or a performance of modern dance. In the beginning there is lots of voluntary work, artistic expertise, personal contacts and enthusiasm but perhaps less managerial professionalism or money. If the idea is successful and the artistic basis is sound, the small initiative can grow and it becomes a more and more popular event with a famous spirit and a steady audience. Also the amount of public funding, sponsors and managerial professionalism grows. This kind of a gradual process is also very efficient in committing lots of people in the preparation of the festival and attracting voluntary people to work during the festival or event itself.

Because the initiative and the process are normally very local, social and cultural sustainability is in fact built in the process. The community is committed to the event. If the professional management then later comes from elsewhere, it doesn’t matter, because the concept of the festival has already anchored itself in the community.

On the other hand, there are festivals that are started for strategic reasons, e.g. because they are seen as a means of economic growth and regional development. The decisions are made on the administrative level and the commitment of the local community is minor or doesn’t exist at all.

CASE: VOLTER KILPI LITERATURE FESTIVAL

In the case of Volter Kilpi literature festival, the start of the festival followed the latter pattern: the whole idea of the literature festival came from the administrative level, the municipality and the regional arts council. The aims of the project where clearly stated in the very beginning and they were strategic: a literature festival was started and financed because it was seen as a good means of regional development. This was also the basis for the funding: the project was financed by the structural funds of EU. Naturally, the cultural values were not denied.

From the very beginning, there was a strong network of prominent actors supporting the plan. There was the local and the regional administration as well as the regional representatives of the government. The University of Turku with some of its schools and its library and the nearest adult education centre where also strongly committed to the project. Within the network there existed a strong consensus that the project should be implemented on the basis of socially and culturally sustainable principles.

Talks about socially, culturally and economically sustainable tourism are not necessarily only talks, they can be implemented in practise too. You only need to make a conscious decision and a well designed strategy and you will succeed. I will now give some examples of the strategy of the project and how the principles of sustainable development were tried to be applied. The idea was that the future festival was going to be a festival which the local people could feel a festival of their own. As a result of a successful project the local people would welcome the visitors as their own guests, being proud of the fact that this famous writer wrote about their home parish and their own landscape. We wanted all the inhabitants to be in one way or another mingled with the project and its implementation.

What possible means are there to do this?

1. INFORMATION

From the very beginning, it was acknowledged that information of the project had to be as open as possible and as frequent as possible. The local newspapers were informed, they forwarded the information, newsletters were sent to various target groups, numerous information occasions were organised etc. etc. I visited the local shops and bars and talked to the people and so on and so on. My aim was that that all the 1000 inhabitants of the municipality would know what was going on and what I was doing there.

2. COMMON PLANNING

The objective was to involve as many people as possible to the creation process of the new festival. This meant that all the planning had to be done in groups and workshops. In the very beginning, I invited all the inhabitants of the municipality and representatives of the different partners, such as the regional arts council, the provincial museum and various schools of the university of Turku to a common planning session lasting one whole day. I succeeded in gathering almost 50 people together to plan the coming festival. I think that most of the ideas implemented the following summer, started to incubate at that occasion. Many subgroups which still exist were founded there. Also a start of a new network was created: the local people had now direct contacts with the academic researchers and vice versa. Perhaps the most important thing was that a positive spirit was created and it has lasted and developed well – with some exceptions which always exist.

3. CO-OPERATION WITH THE ADULT EDUCATION CENTRE

The locally operating adult education centre was a very important partner. Volter Kilpi’s main work, Alastalon salissa , is considered a very difficult book to read, and only few know that there is lots of humour in it. However, the adult education centre started a reading circle with a professional instructor. There was a group reading the book the whole winter 1998 – 1999 and participants became extremely enthusiastic. They used to talk about the book in the local shops, they used the old dialect as it was written in the book and one of the participants of the circle, the county manager, even started to cite Kilpi in his speeches.

Not everybody reads and you cannot make them to. For those, we started a sewing circle. A designer designed époque costumes which all those who wanted could make for themselves. They base on the clothes worn in the late 1800’s.The woman’s dress is called a sea captain’s wife’s dress or a Kustavi dress. Nobody made a man’s suit the first year but more than a dozen of women sewed a dress for herself. Some, those who don’t have the skill, such as myself, had a dress made. The women wear them all the time during the festival week and not only are they there to express the spirit of togetherness but also to create the atmosphere for the visitors.

3. CO-OPERATION WITH THE LOCAL SCHOOL

Three years ago, nobody could have imagined that school children could read Volter Kilpi’s books, that difficult they are considered. But now we know that they can! The teachers only had to select the extracts very carefully for not create the opposite effect, because, as we all very well know, schools can be very effective in spoiling experiences of the works of national writers with a boring style of teaching.

The school children also drew pictures inspired by the books, made field trips to the scenes of the book etc. As I see it, one very important thing was, that through this activity, the children
(and to some extent their parents too) also became familiar with the local past. The school books tell about history of Finland, but Kilpi’s books are about the past of their own community.

Also another important thing was started, at least partly inspired by the project: the teachers of this school with less than 100 pupils have decided that their school is specialised in literature in general, not only in this writer. The have created a system of writers as the children’s godmothers and godfathers, who visit the school every now and then, they have visited the International book fair of Turku etc. This has been possible because the teachers themselves are so enthusiastic with literature.

4. MAKING VISIBLE

Very often you become blind to the specialities around you. You don’t see the things that are always there, things that belong to your every day life. But some times an outsider can make them visible again.

One of the artists in residence of the regional arts council had the following idea: Since in most of the local families there has been a member who used to work as seaman or sea captain, in there homes there are lots of exotic objects brought by them from all over the world. All the inhabitants of Kustavi were asked to search the attics and basements in order to look for these objects. This way the process of searching objects has awakened the local people’s interest to their own family’s past and objects in their homes that have seemed worth nothing, have gained new value. These things had been most beautiful when they were brought by a loving and long missed member of the family, from the most exotic region of the world, but times passing, their beauty was lost and they had become kitsch. Now the beauty was gained again! The objects have also a connection to the works of Kilpi, who often uses them as symbol of the wealth of his characters.

This artist, Sussi Henrikson photographed dozens of objects such as Chinese coffee cups, fragile alabaster vases, beauty boxes made of corals and sea shells etc. In 2000 during the festival week, there was a photograph exhibition. A series of post cards was also produced

HOW DID WE SUCCEED?

The amount of local commitment to the festival is difficult to measure. However, there is now a locally based association, responsible for the festival and the networks. The amount of local voluntary work has increased every year, so has the amount of people working for the festival. The school and the adult education centre develop new ideas independently of the festival organisation. Two village associations produce their own program during the festival, naturally in co-operation with the festival organisation. The spirit is, if possible, even better now than during the starting year when the representatives of the organising project and the local people were not yet really familiar with each others.

ECONOMICAL SUSTAINABILITY

The principle of economical sustainability is here handled from a very narrow point of you, with a concrete example from the literature festival case. As far as I have understood, developing tourism on a economically sustainable basis means that a good deal of the economic profit or income should go to local inhabitants of the destination. Too often the case is that big global or at least urban investors gather most of the profit of the business even if the activity itself takes place in the “exotic” country side where local people’s labour and culture is exploited and the people are unable to use the profits themselves for example to take care of the environment of the cites. Finally the destination is too wore out to be attractive any more.

One of the main objectives of the literature festival project was to increase the economical activity in the region and especially to strengthen the local tourism business. It is obvious that during the festival, the local hotels, the local restaurants and e.g. the guides would have more clients. But what we wanted was more. We wanted to add to all the products sold to the visitors, some extra value based on the local culture and Kilpi’s works.

We started again with a common planning session with the people running tourism business in the region. After that, several product workshops were founded. And what is a product workshop? It is a combination of four kinds of expertise:

1. The one who makes the basic product (for example an artisan or an owner of a restaurant)
2. An expert on the substance (for example a teacher in a school of arts and crafts, a cook or a chef)
3. An expert on the additional value (this time literature)
4. Knowledge about the target group

I will know describe one of the product work shops in detail, in order to give a more concrete idea what it was about.

CASE: THE MENU WORKSHOP

1. The one who makes the basic product, (the restaurant owner, his cook, farmers and fishermen who produce the raw material)
2. An expert on the substance ( a prominent chef, Per Erik Silver)
3. An expert on the additional value (myself)
4. Knowledge about the target group (myself again)

The aim of this workshop existed only in my mind but there it was quite clear: In front of my eyes I saw literal menus. I wanted to create menus for the restaurants where the dishes would be made of locally produced raw materials, would be modern modifications of traditional dishes and would have a connection to Kilpi’s books.

I also knew that a menu consisting of these kinds of elements would be quite trendy. And I knew the target group: well educated, academic urban people, a female teacher of history, mother tongue and literature from Helsinki being the very typical representative of the visitors.

Fortunately, the local food tradition had been collected by interviewing people in the 1930’s and the material was kept in an archive at the university. This was the basis. The second step was to explore very carefully everything that Volter Kilpi wrote about eating and drinking and fortunately it was easy to find useful extracts.

Next step was to invite a famous and prominent chef to combine these elements with the locally produced material to produce new dishes. The workshop had several sessions with many participants of and finally about a dozen interested people rehearsed everything in practise: we organised a test party with dozens of dishes. The names of dishes were from the book, the dishes were modern applications of the traditional dishes served in parties. In the test party, while people were tasting the dishes, there was a lady reading a party scene from Kilpi’s book. The women were dressed with new Kustavi dresses. Everything was perfect, thanks to the marvellous visiting chef who conducted the party beautifully. All the guests were pleased and the concept was praised. Renewals were asked for immediately afterwards by those who were not able to participate.

The problems started when the party was over. Finally only few of the participants really wanted to do the whole thing again independently during the festival itself, without the chef. I am afraid that many of the participants of the work shop didn’t really see the potential there was in creation of a literal profile of their own restaurant. Only one of the restaurants finally had a literal menu during the festival and it was a success. There were three courses, all called after Kilpi’s texts, and an extract of the book, describing a meal of sea captains, was printed aside.

On the other hand, at least in Southwest Finland, this kind of ideas need an incubation time, people want to think and to be sure first. Next year, there were two groups of women who wanted to modify the theme and serve a meal to the festival guests. Finally., guests and hostesses were both satisfied with the results.

I still believe in the concept of the product workshops. Besides the menu work shop we had a workshop for artisans and a work shop for guides. Even if the results were not exactly what I was expecting, they were satisfactory. We did create new products with the additional value based on literature. As side products new networks in various branches of business were created.

The principles of social, cultural and economical sustainability can be implemented in practise, for example in the development of tourism.


Hanna Nurminen
Archipelago Cultural management
Merimasku
Finland

hannanur@wakkanet.fi
www.mbseurope.org/hanna/hanna_nurminen.htm