The government presented its plan on Sunday June 18 to control tourist flows and peaks in attendance which overload certain French sites at certain times of the year. In order to help professionals in the sector, an online platform bringing together various resources, developed by Atout France, will be launched in the first half of 2024, accompanied by the creation of a national observatory dedicated to major tourist sites.
“France is the number one tourist destination in the world, but we are sorely lacking in data. We are therefore going to set up a national observatory of major tourist sites to create an information base and shared indicators which will facilitate the work of analyzing flows”, declared Olivia Grégoire, Minister Delegate for Trade, in an interview with the newspaper Le Figaro. “It is up to the State, hand in hand with the territories, with the tourist sites, to put in place methods to inform tourists and residents, or even to support municipalities in flow management measures “, she added.
To this end, a practical guide will be drafted by the end of 2023 by a working group made up of actors from various backgrounds (institutions, researchers, professional federations) to define the concepts of “overtourism”, “overcrowding” and “peaks of attendance” in order to allow a common understanding of the phenomenon.
A communication campaign “with influencers” will also make it possible to raise awareness among foreign and French tourist customers of the challenges of a better distribution of tourist flows and practices, according to the press kit released by the government.
According to the World Tourism Organization, 95% of world tourists visit less than 5% of land, including France. In France, 80% of tourist activity is concentrated in 20% of our territory, according to the government. The consequences are multiple, such as the rise in the price of real estate in tourist areas and the harmful impacts on the environment, not to mention an effect of “rejection” of tourists by the local populations, or even opposition to tourism infrastructure projects.