The comprehensive workshop programme was jointly developed by the Director of the Competence Centre, Prof. Matthias Fuchs, together with the members of the Scientific Committee, Prof. Serena Volo and Prof. Federico Boffa.

Following a short opening address by the Head of the Centre, Prof. Fuchs (unibz) and Prof. Wolfram Höpken (University of Applied Sciences Weingarten-Ravensburg) delivered a presentation entitled “Multi-Modal Data Analytics for Sustainable Tourism”.  Recently completed studies were presented, including search engine-based and online feedback-driven forecasts of guest arrivals as well as the identification of tourism-related points of interest, tourists’ movement patterns, the extraction of emotions and automated image recognition all by using online feedback data and AI-based methods. Finally, an outlook was provided on the future use of large language models (LLMs) at the Competence Centre to develop decision-support systems for destinations using multi-modal tourism data (UGC, CRM, data from online platforms) with the aim of strengthening sustainable guest and host processes, respectively. The remotely delivered presentation by Dr. Tobias Eberle (ZF Friedrichshafen) on first analysis results derived from Google Maps data from South Tyrol concluded the first of five presentation blocks.

The second block, titled “Tourism Satellite Accounts, Input–Output Methodology and Circular Economy in Tourism”, was introduced by Prof. Fuchs. Drawing on completed Swedish studies, it was outlined how tourism multipliers can be used to analyse distributional efficiency and circular economy approaches in tourism. First comparative results for South Tyrol were presented as well. Dr. Georg Lun, Director of the Economic Research Institute (WIFO) of the Bolzano Chamber of Commerce, introduced the project of the “South Tyrol Tourism Satellite Account”, which will enable an even more reliable assessment of the economic importance of tourism in the future.

The third presentation block focused on “Tourism Sustainability and Ethics”. After critically reflecting on sustainability concepts in tourism, Prof. Fuchs (unibz) presented key transformative frameworks in tourism, such as participatory and regenerative destination concepts. Referring to Aristotle, Kant and Wittgenstein, the philosopher Dr. Ralf Lüfter (unibz) succeeded in highlighting the differences between scientific and ethical knowledge by fruitfully integrating them into the discourse on sustainable tourism. This thematic session was concluded with a contribution by Carlo Runggaldier, CEO of the Destination St. Vigilio di Marebbe, who presented major ethical values and principles that underpin the development of the destination.

The fourth block was dedicated to the topic “Sustainable Tourism Mobility”. Prof. Elisabeth Gsottbauer (unibz) highlighted the necessity of tourism mobility research to achieve sustainability goals. Subsequently, she provided an overview of the project “Mobility Lab South Tyrol”, implemented in cooperation with the Competence Centre for Sustainable Tourism. The block concluded with a presentation of comparative findings regarding the two bycycle-path projects “Kaltern–Bozen” and “Bruneck–Gais” presented by a former staff member of the Competence Centre, Attila Glász.

The final, fifth presentation block on “Network Science for a Sustainable Tourism Economy” was delivered by Prof. Rodolfo Baggio (Bocconi University). The astrophysicist and tourism scholar first introduced the theoretical foundations and major methods of network science. Subsequently, he illustrated how network-analytical approaches can be applied to analyse sustainability-related phenomena in tourism.

The International Scientific Workshop concluded at 6:30 p.m. The 15 participants, including three attending remotely, agreed that they had contributed to an inspiring workshop and looked forward to a joint dinner at the b.local restaurant at the NOI Techpark in Bruneck.

Photo of the participants: from left to right:  Dr. Georg Lun (WIFO), Attila Glàsz (Hungarian Cycling Tourism Association), CEO Carlo Runggaldier (St. Vigil in Enneberg), Dr. Ralf Lüfter (unibz), Prof. Elisabeth Gsottbauer (unibz), Philipp Corradini (EURAC), Prof. Wolfram Höpken (Universität Weingarten-Ravensburg), Prof. Rodolfo Baggio (Bocconi), Prof. Matthias Fuchs (unibz), Dr. Konstantina Ntasiou (Hellenic Ministry of Culture)