Keynote Speakers

Professor Michael C. Hall is an internationally renowned academic, speaker and author in the field of tourism research and a prolific writer on various aspects of tourism including a recent volume on lake-based tourism. He is currently Professor of Marketing in the Department of Management at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch, New Zealand. Dr. Hall’s research has focused on a wide variety of tourism contexts and issues including tourism mobility, food and wine marketing, regional development and social/green marketing, event management, place branding and marketing and the use of tourism as an economic development and conservation mechanism. Recently, he has published on lake-based tourism, second-home tourism and tourism and climate change.  He is the author and editor of over 40 books and 250 journal articles and book chapters.

Professor Hall’s keynote address is entitled Lakes as Sustainable Tourism Destinations: Integrating Conservation and Development.

Associate Professor Rhonda Koster is a faculty member in the School of Outdoor Recreation, Parks & Tourism and is affiliated with the Centre for Tourism and Community Development Research at Lakehead University. Her PhD research was on rural community economic development and the use of tourism as a strategy for economic diversification.  Dr. Koster's current research and publication focuses on the broad field of rural community-based tourism. Specifically within this field, she is studying the role of community-based tourism in First Nations communities in Canada and its capacity to contribute to economic and social sustainability. Her current projects include building capacity for rural tourism through appreciative inquiry, the impacts of climate change on the well-being of communities in Northern Ontario's Hudson Bay Lowlands, the role of regionalism in rural tourism, and the constraining and supporting factors affecting rural community development.

Dr Koster's keynote address is entitled: Across the Prairies to the Shores of Gitchee-Gumee: Reflections on a Decade of Engaging in Rural and Community-based Tourism Research.

Plenary Speakers

Dr. R. Harvey Lemelin is an Associate Professor in the School of Outdoor Recreation, Parks & Tourism at Lakehead University in Thunder Bay, Canada, and the Lakehead University representative on the Interim Management Board for the Lake Superior National Marine Conservation Area.  He has published extensively on the socio-economic and socio-environmental dimensions of ecotourism and wildlife-human interactions in Northern Canada. Dr. Lemelin is the Principal Investigator for two SSHRC sponsored grants: Climate Change and Community Well-being in Northern Ontario and The Relationship of the Social Economy to Community Development and Park Creation: A Case Study in Lutsel K'e, and he is also involved in a number of additional research projects with Parks Canada and Environment Canada. Dr. Lemelin is also a founding member of the World Heritage Tourism Research Network and the International Polar Tourism Research Network.

The title of his paper is: Protected areas in and around Lake Superior and the role of indigenous peoples.

Dr. Laurence A. G. Moss has innovatively pioneered and applied strategic analytical and planning methods to today’s complex opportunities and issues of socio-cultural and biophysical change and development. For over two decades he has focused an interdisciplinary, ecological and regional perspective on the continuity and transition of small communities while sustaining their live giving eco-systems, with a particular interest in amenity migration. He has worked principally at the regional and local community level in western North America and Pacific Asia, but also in central Europe, and at national and international policy levels. In addition to his hands-on practice and applied research, Dr. Moss has taught at a number of universities and designed and facilitated many workshops and other training mediums. In 2006 he edited the 1st book on global amenity migration, and in 2008 at the Banff Centre led the 1st international conference on understanding and managing this driving force of change in mountain regions. He directs the International Amenity Migration Centre and Laurence Moss & Associates, both recently headquartered in Kaslo, BC, Canada.

The title of Dr. Moss’s paper is Implications of amenity migration for lakes and their symbiotic human communities.

Dr. Adriana M. Otero is a Professor in the Faculty of Tourism & Director of the Center for Studies for Sustainable Tourism Planning and Development at Universiad Nacional del Comahue in Neuquén, Patagonia, Argentina. Dr Otero recent research has focused on the environmental and social impacts of amenity migration in the Seven Lakes Corridor in Neuquén, Patagonia. She has undertaken research for the World Bank, and for a number of provinces and municipalities in Patagonia and elsewhere in South America. Dr. Otero is also on the editorial boards of research journals such as the Journal of Ecotourism and the Journal of Tourism and Recreation.

The title of her paper is Amenity-led Urbanisation in the Seven Lakes Corridor, Neuquén, Argentina: Threats and Promises.

Professor Phil Dearden is an internationally recognized academic, author and researcher in marine protected areas. He is currently Chair of the Geography Department at the University of Victoria in British Columbia. Professor Dearden is the Leader of the Marine Protected Area Working Group of the Ocean Management Research Network and is active in developing a research agenda to assist in the establishment and effective management of marine protected areas worldwide. He is Co-Chair of Parks Canada’s National Marine Conservation Area Science Advisory Network and Leader of the Marine Protected Area Research Group within the Geography Department at the University of Victoria. His current projects include whale shark tourism in Honduras, SCUBA-diving as an incentive-based conservation mechanism in Thailand and governance of marine protected areas in Canada.

Professor Dearden’s address is entitled: MPA’s as Agents of Community Development.

William C. Gartner is a Professor of Applied Economics and Extension Educator at University of Minnesota. His PhD is in resource development, with a specialty in resource economics. He has extensive experience in international development in Africa, Eastern Europe, the Middle East and South America. As well, Dr. Gartner specializes in community and regional tourism development, with a focus on marketing, natural resources, and economics. Dr Gartner has studied and published on aspects of lake-based tourism particularly in the USA and Canada.

He has been a committee member of the International Association of Scientific Experts in Tourism (AIEST), Board Chair for the International Academy for the Study of Tourism, President of the International Academy for the Study of Tourism and won numerous awards including the Explorer Award and Tourism for Tomorrow Award.

The title of his paper is Lake-based Recreation: Its Past, Present and Future.