Traditional agricultural landscapes, between Heritagization, Commodification and Tourism Sustainability
Chair: Elena Dell'Agnese (University of Milan-Bicocca)
Under World Heritage criteria, cultural landscapes are defined as cultural properties "illustrative of the evolution of human society and settlement over time, under the influence of the physical constraints and/or opportunities presented by their natural environment and of successive social, economic and cultural forces, both external and internal".
Therefore, more and more applications for this category include agricultural sites.
In fact, traditional agricultural practices, and the cultural landscape that derives from them, are often endowed with aesthetic significance and become objects of conservation and heritage. Sometimes, they are also the result of agricultural practices that involve a great deal of hard physical work, which can in no way be replaced by mechanized agriculture.
Thanks to this process of patrimonialisation, traditional agricultural landscapes can become the object of tourist attraction. Food and wine tourism, if linked to local agricultural production, is generally considered a form of slow and sustainable tourism, i.e. a providential activity for the territorial revaluation of the local agricultural system and for the preservation of the environment. But "the exceptional interaction between man and his environment", which is the basis of the Unesco recognition, is often interrupted. On the one hand, tourists often do not see that, beyond the splendid panorama and the wonderful wine, landscape in front of them, and that the products they consume, are the result of an extraordinary physical effort. On the other hand, agricultural regions subject to heritage conservation may also undergo an exodus from agriculture, especially when the expansion of tourist activities offers the local workforce jobs much less demanding and at the same time more profitable than farming. The difficulty of finding local workers often leads to the employment of seasonal, underpaid workers without adequate housing. Here, environmental and cultural sustainability are not associated with social sustainability.
The session is open to documents exploring the difficult link between tourism promotion and the preservation of traditional farming practices, within heritage cultural landscapes. Both papers focusing on theoretical reflection and case studies in the following fields are welcome. So, increasingly, nominations for this category include agricultural sites.
Indeed, traditional agricultural practices, and the resulting cultural landscape, are often endowed with aesthetic significance and become an object of conservation and heritagization. They are also the result of farming practices entailing a great deal of hard physical work, which can in no way be replaced by mechanised farming.
Thanks to this process of patrimonialization, traditional agricultural landscapes may become an object of tourist attraction. Food and wine tourism, if linked to local agricultural production, is generally considered a form of slow and sustainable tourism, that is, a providential activity for the territorial revaluation of the local agricultural system and for the conservation of the environment. But "the outstanding interaction between people and their environment" which is the basis of the Unesco recognition, is often interrupted.
On one hand, tourists often do not see that the landscape in front of them, and that the products they consume are the result of extraordinary physical effort. On the other, agricultural regions subject to heritage conservation may also subject to an exodus from agriculture, especially when the expansion of tourism activities offers the local workforce jobs more profitable than farming. The difficulty of finding local workers therefore leads to the employment of foreign seasonal workers, often underpaid. In this case, environmental and cultural sustainability are not associated with social sustainability.
The session is open to papers exploring the difficult link between tourism promotion and conservation of traditional agricultural parcels, within heritagized cultural landscapes. Both papers focusing on theoretical reflection and case studies in the following fields are welcomed.