Sweden - Swedish Lapland

In Swedish Lapland, major tourism operators on the international market have good product and market skills, while many operators not yet established on the international markets need to develop their skills in product development, marketing and selling to the international markets. The different levels of service quality and hostmanship are considered as an obstacle within the Barents Region when developing joint cross-border products of high quality for the export level. The same holds for safety, ecotourism and sustainability as no common Nordic or Barents certifications and regulations exist, e.g. for different adventure-, experience- and nature activities, which are popular forms of tourism in Sweden.  From the entrepreneurs’ perspective, legal, logistical and infrastructural knowledge is the indispensable basis for developing common products. 

Many Swedish micro firms are not familiar with the markets and the guest’s cultures. Furthermore, since there are serious differences between the Barents countries, the entrepreneurs expressed their concern towards common development in the near future. By facilitating cooperation through public organizations, the obstacles will be reduced and new opportunities will arise. Barents cooperation projects for specific tourism areas such as MICE, nature-based tourism, adventure tourism, fishing tourism, etc. are exemplar. Ideally, joint Barents tourism products are on the one hand based on the natural resources, the destination values and the market needs but on the other hand copycatting and similar offerings are avoided.