Assessing the economic impacts of nature based tourism in Scotland

For these motivational reasons, Greenwood and Yeoman (2006b) consider cycle
tourism as notoriously difficult to define and measure. However, to give some scale to
the cycling market they cite VisitScotland research from 2004 showing that cycling as a
main activity or representing part of a visit was undertaken on 1 million UK resident
trips to Scotland in 2003 (8% of all trips) which generated £219 million in revenue. The
contribution from holidays where cycling was the main purpose of the holiday
comprised £20 million expenditure and 100,000 trips (or 1% of all trips to Scotland),
and where it was part of a holiday trip comprised £199 million expenditure and 900,000
trips.
In 2003, of the UK visitors for whom cycling was the main purpose of their holiday trip,
32% were from Scotland and 63% from the rest of the UK. Where cycling represented
part of the holiday trip, the market share of visits was split 58% Scottish residents and
39% rest of the UK.
However, the VisitScotland Factsheet (2009) identifies only 3% of UK holiday trips as
including cycling as an activity undertaken while in Scotland in 2008. This is equivalent
to cycling being involved in 364,000 holiday trips. Even a simplistic calculation taking
3% of total UK visitor spend (£1,986 million), i.e. £59.6 million, and allocating that sum
to cycling gives a figure much lower than the Greenwood & Yeoman figure for 2003.
The UK Tourism Survey three year average 2006-2008 supplied by VisitScotland
shows an even lower figure of 284,000 cycling trips. VisitScotland (2009) also gives a
figure of 4% or 486,000 UK visitor trips undertaking ‘adventure activities’, which could
include mountain biking.
The growth in mountain bike activity is reflected in the EKOS and TRC (2009) study
which identified 1.328 million visits (0.9 m in South Scotland). This study estimated the
current economic impact of the mountain biking tourism market in Scotland as
expenditure of £119m, and generated employment of 3,470 FTEs and GVA of £68m.
However, this includes all of those that engage with mountain biking (and all of their trip
expenditure) irrespective of the main motivation for their trip or whether they are day
trippers or overnight visitors. Further analysis aimed at narrowing the focus to those
for whom it is their main reason and/or a key part of their trip provides an estimate of
£46.5 million expenditure; 1,360 FTEs; and £26.6 million GVA. By way of contrast, the
UK Tourism Survey three year average 2006-2008 supplied by VisitScotland shows
134,000 trips in Scotland involving mountain biking, with an estimated visitor spend of
£39 million.
Of the £119 million of overall mountain bike expenditure, 86% is estimated to be from
overnight trips, i.e. £102 million from mountain bike tourism (as opposed to day trips),
including both those resident in Scotland and from the rest of the UK. Southern
Scotland is the destination for 68% of visits (0.9m), and the 7 Stanes evaluation
provides a proportion of 80% for non local riders – suggesting 0.722m trips, with 84%
coming from outwith Scotland (0.606m). We believe that other mountain bike centres
further north in Scotland are used more extensively by local and Scottish based riders,
and the ratios for these are more likely to be 25% local day trip, 50% Scottish based
and 25% rest of UK based.
In our view, the VisitScotland (2009) and the UKTS figures are an underestimate and
are more focused on cycling as a main trip activity, whereas the 2003 figures were
perhaps an overestimate in that all cycling was included, even a short cycle as part of a
longer trip. The reasons for this could be that cyclists are under-represented in
samples, especially mountain bikers who tend to be less available than the average
person for survey interview. The weather influences cycling and although cycles can
be carried over long distances by car, smaller vehicles make this less appealing.
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