Present and future tourism development of Russian settlements on Svalbard: Exploring practices, perspectives and possibilities

Russia's vast Arctic territories are playing a vital role in the process of country's overall socio-economic development and not least when it comes to tourist development. Svalbard's two Russian settlements (Barentsburg and Pyramiden) are targets to Russ ia's renewed interests when it comes to the process of destination development. Already in 2006 the first organized groups of Russian schoolchildren visited the archipelago as the result of the joint efforts of Russian Embassy on Spitsbergen, Ministry of Education and Arktikugol (Russian coal mining company). Moreover, in 2012 a Russian Agency of Tourism (Rosturism) claimed that future destination development of settlements on Spitsbergen should be based on utilising a Norwegian expertise and experience f rom the area. Paradoxically as it may seem a head of the destination management organization 'Svalbard Tourism' still has a limited knowledge concerning the Russian plans in this question. This pilot study is aiming to evaluate the first results of the destination development of Russian settlements, as well as the future possibilities for a synergy effects between Russian and Norwegian tourism development on Svalbard. This is done by using a semi-structured interviews with several principle stakeholders from major tourist organizations both Russian and Norwegian, and combined with the participant observations in the field.