Abstract:

Tourism-dependent outermost regions face increasing governance complexity as climate variability intensifies environmental risk, visitor pressure and safety concerns. In Madeira, the development of the SGIPA (Integrated Trail and Activities Management System) exposed a critical structural limitation in conventional carrying capacity models: correction factors are historically defined, static and multiplicative, failing to reflect the heterogeneous exposure of trails to evolving climatic stressors.

Traditional effective carrying capacity approaches, based on models such as Cifuentes (1992), apply correction factors proportionally and uniformly. However, Madeira’s trail network presents differentiated risk profiles: exposed coastal routes such as Ponta de São Lourenço are highly sensitive to solar radiation and wind; mountain ridge trails face wind gusts and rockfall hazards; levada systems are vulnerable to flooding and soil saturation. Applying uniform or historically averaged correction factors produces distortions, over-penalisation in some contexts and delayed intervention in others.

This paper argues that static correction logics are structurally incompatible with climate volatility in outermost regions. We propose a Climate-Adaptive LAC Governance Framework in which correction factors are dynamically modulated through weighted relevance and real-time climatic inputs retrieved via meteorological APIs. Rather than multiplying fixed factors, the model introduces a context-sensitive global correction function that adjusts acceptable use thresholds according to trail typology, exposure profile and forecasted climate conditions.

Historical and predictive climate data are integrated into the governance architecture to enable proactive threshold modulation. This allows management actions such as slot reconfiguration, adaptive zoning, capacity adjustment and preventive closures to be triggered before degradation or safety incidents occur. The framework reframes Limits of Acceptable Change from a monitoring-based instrument into a dynamic governance mechanism capable of anticipatory regulation.

Madeira, as an outermost and insular region with concentrated tourism flows and increasing climate instability, operates as a laboratory for climate-sensitive management innovation. The paper contributes to management scholarship by conceptualising correction factors as governance modulators rather than static technical parameters, advancing adaptive governance theory under environmental uncertainty. The proposed framework offers transferable implications for tourism-dependent territories facing intensified climate risk.

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Primary Track: Tourism and Hospitality Experience Management

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Prof Elvio Camacho