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Agence France-Presse

A frozen landscape with breathtaking views, Greenland wants to attract more tourists but its remote location and fragile environment – which make it a unique destination – also pose challenges.
“The effects of global heating are at their most pronounced in the Arctic,” says Michael Hall, a professor and tourism expert at the University of Canterbury in New Zealand.
Global warming is accelerating the loss of Arctic sea ice in summer, as well as the melting of permafrost, ice shelves and glaciers, Hall says, referring to elements that contribute to the island’s uniqueness.
Across Greenland, residents are witnessing first-hand the effects of global warming.

In Maniitsoq, a town on the southwestern coast, the sea ice has not been solid enough to walk on since 2018. Residents have also seen it shrink from year to year, in addition to less abundant snowfalls.
Tourists are nonetheless awestruck by the vistas.
“It’s terra incognita,” says Amy Yankovic, a 55-year-old American tourist.
The Texas native travelled for almost 24 hours to get to Greenland, taking three connecting flights.
Tourism accounts for around 8 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions, according to the United Nations, most of which is attributed to transport.
There is “a kind of ‘last-chance tourism’, where visiting these endangered sites is about wanting to see them before they disappear”, says Emmanuel Salim, an assistant professor of geography at the University of Toulouse in France.

He adds that similar destinations, such as Churchill in Canada – known as the “polar bear capital of the world” – have tried to position themselves as places for learning about the environment.
But while such destinations can raise awareness about better environmental practices, their carbon footprints continue to rise, he laments.
Developing tourism in a fragile environment is a tricky balancing act.
“Mitigation of the impacts of global heating on the Arctic is a global responsibility,” says Hall, adding that “current mitigation attempts are greatly inadequate”.
Greenlandic authorities insist they want a prudent development of the tourism sector, to create jobs.
A new runway at the airport in Greenland’s capital, Nuuk, that can accommodate international flights is expected to lift the tourism sector, at the risk of inundating the infrastructure and fragile ecosystem of the Arctic island, which is an autonomous territory of Denmark.

To get to Nuuk, travellers have had to fly from Iceland or transit through Kangerlussuaq, a former US military base in the north with the only runway big enough for international flights to land.
Nuuk airport will finally have the capacity to welcome bigger planes from November 28. Another new runway is due to open in Ilulissat, north of Nuuk, in 2026.
“In the past, it was very difficult to travel to Greenland, and the new airports will completely change the infrastructure to get here,” airport spokesman Milan Lund Vraa says.
Home to about a third of Greenland’s 57,000 residents, Nuuk will have to boost its hospitality capacity.
“There will be so many [tourists] that there will not be enough places for them,” predicts Gideon Lyberth, mayor of Maniitsoq, which is about 150km (93 miles) north of Nuuk.
Lyberth hopes his town will benefit from a rise in visitors coming to admire the island’s pristine fiords, icebergs and untouched wilderness.
I don’t think Greenland is ready for mass tourism, mostly because of the infrastructure we have. The hospital is understaffed and the walking paths aren’t maintained
Nuuk resident Paaliit Molgaard Rasmussen
The number of tourists travelling to Greenland has increased by 9 per cent per year in recent years, Lund Vraa says.
But Nuuk will need more hotel rooms by 2027 if the number of tourists grows by just 5 per cent per year, according to a recent report.
New restaurants will probably also be needed, with Nuuk currently home to just 15.
Tourism numbers could grow even more than that, with new flights planned coming from Denmark and North America, including a twice-weekly direct flight from New York to Nuuk.
The new runway “represents an enormous opportunity for travellers keen on adventure and who want to be the first to visit a new and unique destination”, says Heather Kelly, director of research at the Adventure Travel Trade Association.

Dubbed the “Venice of Greenland”, with coloured houses built on a mountainside overlooking the water, Maniitsoq is home to 2,500 inhabitants.
Hopes are high there for a tourism boom.
“We need it. In my town, there are fewer and fewer people, people are moving to bigger towns with more jobs,” says a sailor named Michael who declined to give his last name.
Residents are cautiously dipping their toes into the tourism business.
“In recent years we’ve seen that young people have started to become tour operators,” says mayor Lyberth.
In 2023, Greenland’s tourism sector brought in almost 1.9 billion Danish kroner (US$274 million), accounting for almost 10 per cent of the territory’s gross domestic product.
A full-scale tourism boom, similar to the one Iceland has had over the past 15 years, will take time.
“All of the infrastructure needs to be in place beforehand, and that’s not something that will happen in a day,” says Taatsi Fleischer, a spokesman for Arctic Circle Business, which supports entrepreneurs in western Greenland.

But do Greenlanders really want a tourism boom?
Feelings are lukewarm towards the massive, heavily polluting cruise ships increasingly descending on the island, and legislation is being considered to ban them from some areas.
The tourists that pour out of the ships “walk around town … and don’t talk to people” before leaving a few hours later, says Michael the sailor, who prefers travellers who fly in for longer stays.
Arctic tourism is being affected by climate change.
Skiing, hiking and cruise ships “are directly impacted by the shrinking ice sheet and the associated processes that affect access to sites”, says Salim of the University of Toulouse.
“In order to develop a destination like this today, you have to think about the image and the reality of a future post-Arctic landscape, in which snow-capped mountains, polar bears and ice floes – which have shaped the image of these places – no longer exist.”
Residents are aware of the need to develop tourism slowly.
“I don’t think Greenland is ready for mass tourism, mostly because of the infrastructure we have,” says Nuuk resident Paaliit Molgaard Rasmussen.
“The hospital is understaffed and the walking paths aren’t maintained.”
Boosting tourism will only work if the local economy is integrated, says Hall of the University of Canterbury.
“If you are going to develop tourism infrastructure, it needs to be seen as part of long-term development, with it also being high quality to make it resilient to environmental change,” he says.


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Greenland wants a tourism boom but many feel cold at the prospect

The Old Colonial Harbour in Nuuk, Greenland’s capital. A new runway at Nuuk airport that can accommodate international flights is expected to lift the tourism sector, at the risk of inundating the infrastructure and fragile ecosystem of the Arctic island. Photo: AFP

Beached icebergs in the Nuuk Fjord, Greenland, on September 1, 2024. Photo: AFP

A tourist looks out from a boat as it sails away from a glacier between Maniitsoq and Sisimiut, in Greenland. Photo: AFP

Passengers disembark from a plane at Nuuk Airport on August 29, 2024. Photo: AFP

A view of the coastline in Nuuk. Photo: AFP

A woman takes photos from a tour boat between Maniitsoq and Sisimiut. Photo: AFP

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Lifestyle

Travel & Leisure

New runways will bring more international tourists seeking Greenland’s breathtaking beauty but could add to the effects of climate change


New runways will bring more international tourists seeking Greenland’s breathtaking beauty but could add to the effects of climate change.
