Recently a new issue of Landabréfið – the journal of the Association of Icelandic Geographers – was disgorged from the printing presses. This time we published a special issue on nature-based tourism, with Gunnþóra Ólafsdóttir as a special editor. The issue stems from a conference and art exhibition that was held in Reykjavík in early 2011. The journal is entirely in English this time and the authors are a highly international group. For example, the esteemed American author Lucy Lippard has a thought-provoking discussion piece about what tourism does to communities. We are quite proud of the journal, and so we should. And we also rigged up a website for the journal, so the future will be digital. Hopefully we can still produce a few paper copies in the future however...
I am especially fond of fresh coriander/cilantro (Coriandrum sativum) and use it a lot in my cooking. But in the supermarket where I do most of my shopping (Bónus) you can only get fresh coriander (and other fresh herbs) from Israel. For me, this is not palatable. Perhaps this coriander was cultivated in a patch that was taken by Israeli military force from the Palestinian people? I have to try elsewhere. Being a consumer is difficult in this day and age.
Last Friday I teamed up with Davíð Arnar Stefánsson, Master student in geography, fellow cyclist and blogger, giving a talk at the yearly research conference of the Icelandic Roads Administration. We presented our research project, about the quality of cycling routes in the Greater Reykjavík area. This was the only presentation at the conference that centred on cycling, which reflects the fact that it has not really been taken seriously as a mode of transport. And certainly not outside of the city. One almost feels sorry for those brave souls who cycle the country's narrow roads in summer. No cycle paths there, not even paved shoulders on the roads. On the other hand, riding paths are becoming a common sight alongside the roads. Does this reflect the differing power of these two lobby groups – horse riders and cyclists – or does the non-consideration of cycling simply reflect of the attitudes of road engineers?
Last week I went with my colleague Guðrún Gísladóttir and a great group of students from geography and tourism on a five-day field course. Such a trip is made every year, with students in their third undergraduate year, but this time the group was unusually large, or 58 students in all. They collected data for various projects they had self designed in accordance with their own interests. This time the district of Austur-Húnavatnssýsla in the north of Iceland was the destination of our trip. Geography students' projects ranged from vegetation in the Skagi peninsula to environmental management in local companies, and those of tourism students included opportunities for birdwatching in the northwest of Iceland, and the image of the two towns in the area, Skagaströnd and Blönduós, to name but a few.
The town of Skagaströnd was our base. And I think I should acknowledge that my own image of that place was rather limited before this trip. Yes, I remembered that Iceland's first freezing trawler had been based in Skagaströnd in the 1980s - the harbinger of great changes for the fishing towns. And of course I associated Skagaströnd with country legend Hallbjörn Hjartarson and his music, as probably most Icelanders do.
But the image changed. In Skagaströnd we found a very interesting and in many ways progressive little place, where people have initiated some incredibly original projects in order to strengthen the town. The marine biotecnology centre BioPol is one such project. No less original is the Nes Artist Residency, where artists from all over the world stay and work on their own art projects. In fact, while there we contributed to a sound art project of the Italian Dario Lazzaretto, about Iceland as a country of recurrent emergency situations... And in this village of 500 inhabitants, the University of Iceland has set up one of its one of its research centres, for the western part of North Iceland. The centre specialises in history and other humanities research. So, Skagaströnd is after all a particularly interesting place.
A little tempest has raged recently because of an impending revision of the Icelandic nature conservation legislation.
Forestry advocates object to a clause about "invasive alien species" which is to be included in the legislation.
Ecologists object to their objections and argue the case from the standpoint of their scientific truth.
I have for a long time been rather apprehensive of "invasive (alien) species" in "Icelandic" nature. Perhaps this is due to my scholarly upbringing in New Zealand and Australia, where the results of
ecological imperialism are all too obvious. But... I cannot but think that here in Iceland the debate is stuck in an unhelpfully polarised mode. Either you LOVE or HATE the Alaska lupin/Sitka spruce/Spanish chevril/Contorta pine. Decide, NOW!
I was just reading an excellent
article by a British geographer, about these issues. He convincingly shows how tricky the concept of "alien" species is, to the extent that it is useless in this context. Instead he suggests that we concentrate on the possible damage to the local biology wrought by incoming organisms.
What I find most interesting about these debates is how they reveal that nature is - always - a socially constructed reality. Socio-cultural values are part and parcel of all debates about nature. This is true whether we belong the camp of forestry advocates or ecologists.
A new report by the European Environment Agency, Europe's ecological backbone: recognising the true value of our mountains, contains a wealth of information about Europe's diverse mountain areas and the changes in nature and society that affect them. A short essay by myself about the development and land use in the central highlands of Iceland is found in the report.
