| That's no big deal in Hawaii- but Greenland? | | | | about SHOPPING! |
| Now there's another idea for Al Gore. Talk | | | | |
| about an "Inconvenient Truth", if it be so. | | | | Even when America is attacked and our Twin |
| But, if the most dire climate forecasts come | | | | Towers were destroyed, some of the first |
| true the tourism industry in Europe's far | | | | words by WW Bush we're, "get out there and |
| north, already feeling the effects of global | | | | spend". |
| warming, may find itself promoting a Santa in | | | | |
| shorts and a camel-drawn sleigh. Yuk! | | | | The village of 2,000 people, located a |
| | | | three-hour drive north of Rovaniemi, has |
| Each year at the end of autumn, residents, | | | | already succeeded in persuading British tour |
| shopkeepers, travel agencies, reindeer | | | | operators to bring planefulls of holiday |
| herders and even politicians in the Finnish | | | | tourists seeking a winter wonderland to their |
| Arctic town of Rovaniemi -- home to Santa | | | | town. While global warming presents several |
| Claus' Village, one of the biggest tourist | | | | short-term advantages (lower energy bills, |
| attractions in Finland -- look to the skies | | | | greater agricultural possibilities, a longer |
| in the hopes of a snowy winter. | | | | summer tourism season), the long-term effects |
| | | | are dire for the region's fauna, flora and |
| The past three or four years have been | | | | local population. Reindeer herding, the |
| difficult in Rovaniemi. Each year they | | | | traditional activity and main income for the |
| attract some 300,000+ visitors eager to meet | | | | 70,000 indigenous Sami people spread out |
| the "real Father Christmas. Real you say? | | | | across the Arctic, is also at risk. |
| Real! | | | | |
| | | | How will Santa do without back ups? |
| This December, with only a few weeks to go | | | | |
| before Christmas, there are only | | | | Sami Ruismaeki is one of Finland's 7,000 |
| seven-and-a-half inches of snow on the | | | | reindeer herders whose livelihood has become |
| ground, just enough for snowmobiles and dog- | | | | more and more precarious. "When it doesn't |
| and reindeer sleighs. But the rivers and | | | | rain, there are no mushrooms and the reindeer |
| lakes, which normally freeze over in winter | | | | aren't able to build up their body fat before |
| and are used to take tourists on snowmobile | | | | the long winter. Then the lichen disappears |
| or sleigh rides, have not turned to ice yet, | | | | under the heavy layers of ice," he said. The |
| and that's bad news. | | | | reindeer "have to be fed with grain or hay, |
| | | | and we have to bring water from home. It's |
| Tourism generates some 345 million US$'s of | | | | not profitable anymore," he said. |
| direct and indirect revenue in Finnish | | | | |
| Lapland, of which about 60 percent comes | | | | We're talking mushrooms and lichen- and |
| during winter. It is an enormous amount of | | | | global warming? |
| money for the region, hit hard by high | | | | |
| unemployment and the rural exodus to bigger | | | | Beats talking about Santa is shorts! |
| towns. And after all Christmas really is | | | | |