Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Provision' (Lithuanian State Tourism Depart-
ment, 2003) as the provision of accommodation,
catering, attractions, amusement and related
services to tourists in farmsteads or individual
living houses by persons with rural tourism busi-
ness licences in the rural areas or towns with less
than 3000 inhabitants and is based on previous
legislation, building on experience in response
to the metamorphosis of the economic context
and business conditions. Interestingly this docu-
ment is the only one that does not explicitly
consider sustainability issues - it focuses instead
on the regulation of practical issues arising from
rural tourism activity.
There are a number of opportunities to
further develop Lithuania's response to the sus-
tainability agenda: eco-labelling, for example, is
underdeveloped. In place are the Blue Flag
programme, which provides municipality awards
for beach quality, and the Green Key programme,
which focuses on the accommodation sector.
Blue Flag has been achieved by two municipali-
ties, Neringa and Palanga. Large hotels in
Vilnius and Klaip
h
da - the Reval and Baltpark
hotels - have participated in the Green Key
programme. No labelling schemes have been
implemented for rural tourism products despite
evidence of high awareness of the importance
of environmental protection and the balancing
of economy and social questions (Armaitien
h
et al
., 2004).
(2500 inhabitants), six villages and over 20
manors are located on the island and adminis-
trated by the Šilut
h
district municipality. The
island is a flat and open alluvial plain and parts
are protected from flooding by dykes. The
unsealed floodplains of the island make a criti-
cally important ecozone between the aquatic
and terrestrial habitats (Breber
et al
., in press)
and in the spring provide a nursery for Curonian
lagoon fish and a foraging place for migratory
birds. Both of these offer important resources
for the development of sustainable rural tourism
products.
Since 1993, the entire Nemunas delta has
been listed under the Ramsar Convention as a
wetland of international importance. Rusn
h
Island
is also protected as a managed landscape reserve
within the Nemunas Delta regional park. Sandy
islets and reedbeds of the lagoon foreshore in
front of the island are protected as a strict nature
reserve with no activities or access allowed. The
regulations of the managed reserve relevant to
sustainable rural tourism development constrain
expansion of arable land acreage at the expense
of meadows and establish the basis for interpre-
tation of the resources of the area for tourists
and residents which should stimulate interest
and tourism activity (Deinoravi
E
ius
et al
., 1999).
Traditionally, fishing has been an impor-
tant part of the economy. Before the changes of
the 1990s, the Rusn
h
fishing cooperative shared
fishing in the Lithuanian part of the Curonian
lagoon with three other cooperatives. Besides
fishing, people were employed in dairy and duck
farming. Fishing quotas, milk and poultry pro-
duction plans were determined centrally, and
the local economy was dependent on cheap
fuel and low-cost manual labour (Roepstorff
and Povilanskas, 1995). The economic reforms
of the 1990s caused a decline of fishing in the
Curonian lagoon and dissolution of the cooper-
atives. On Rusn
h
Island, large-scale husbandry
and duck-farming was economically unviable
and collapsed. Unemployment and emigration
from the island soared as the remaining locals,
mostly people in their 40s and 50s, had to meet
new
The Case Studies
Figure 15.2 shows the location of the three case
studies: Rusn
h
Island, Minija village and Karkl
h
,
on the Baltic Sea coast.
Rusn
Island
Rusn
h
Island is the largest island in the Nemunas
river delta adjacent to the Curonian lagoon with
a total area of 45.2 km
2
. It is isolated from the
mainland by the two main branches of the river:
Atmata in the north and Skirvyt
h
in the south,
which also serves as the state border separating
Rusn
h
Island from the Kaliningrad enclave of
Russia. A few minor river branches cut the island
into separate parts. The township of Rusn
h
survival
challenges
without
possessing
proper knowledge and skills.
In this situation, rural tourism development
was perceived as a cure-all by many local peo-
ple. In 2000, the first steps to facilitate the provi-
sion of rural tourism services on selected pilot
