Together with Ukrainian researchers, he collects and analyzes valuable knowledge on how the tourism sector works in a war situation. Reimann’s experience in Ukraine’s conflict zones shows that getting out into nature and spending quality free time helps residents cope better with difficult times.
Signs of the future scientific path were already visible in childhood
Reimann was called professor even as a child, because he tended to study and forget everything all the time. He himself at that time wanted to become a forest ranger. However, the knowledge that he would probably be bored alone in the forest made him dream of becoming a nature guide. So it happened: in addition to his work as a scientist, Reimann also became a tourism entrepreneur and hiking guide, who brought thousands of Estonians and foreigners to discover Estonia’s nature.
Reimann still remembers signs of his early interest in nature-related work. As a boy in the fourth grade, he accompanied his father, head agronomist of the Kuusalu collective farm, to Tallinn while doing business in Tallinn. Reimann was waiting for his father in the brown-panelled lobby of the Harju county administration on Roosikrantsi Street, there he saw the sign of a nature conservation specialist and thought that one day he too could become one. It turned out to be identical to his childhood dream of becoming a nature guide: when he studied natural sciences at Tallinn University, he worked alongside the school as a nature conservation specialist for the Harju county government.
The birth of new discoveries
The natural environment and landscapes have been at the center of Reimann’s studies and research from the beginning, but the angles of approach have changed over time. The first serious studies focused on how people with different cultural backgrounds feel and understand nature. “With various psychological methods I investigated whether the perception of nature is universal or whether it depends on the type of person and background,” explains Reimann.
What made this research interesting is that there are different schools of thought in the field: some believe that perception of nature is universal, while others believe that perception is influenced by many different factors.
The research results of Reimann and his colleagues confirmed the belief that the perception of nature and the effect of being in it on a person strongly depends on his cultural background. The associate professor recalls that initially his efforts to connect the natural and social sciences caused alienation among ecologists. However, Reimann relied on the dictum of his ecologist teacher: “Boys, in environmental studies both the ant and the girlfriend must be considered equally important.” He thus continues his path as a scientist and in 2015 defends his doctorate at the University of Tartu, focusing on research on the recreational values of landscapes.
Reimann’s subsequent research projects also connected the natural sciences with other scientific disciplines. Among the most interesting research projects cited by other researchers is a study in which he and his colleagues calculated and compared the economic recreational value of the Jägala waterfall and the income from electricity production. It was found that the economic income from the recreational value of the Jägala waterfall is 40 times greater than the income from the electricity produced by the hydropower plant.
“This was a great example of how methodologies to monetize ecosystem services really work,” notes Reimann. At the same time, he adds that such effects must be calculated separately in different cases. He believes that, for example, in the case of the Narva River, the conclusions would have been completely different.
Reimann underlines the need to match research directions with his practical experience as an entrepreneur. “New discoveries are mainly made by combining different research disciplines,” he believes. According to him, a good example of the mix between economics and natural sciences is the way in which the term ecosystem has started to be used more and more often in the field of economics. It originally belonged mainly to the vocabulary of natural scientists.
The researcher must maintain his objectivity and neutrality
He emphasizes that, as a scientist, he is still neutral and independent regarding his research objectives. Even if, for example, he himself believed in the need to preserve the dam on the Jägala River, as a researcher he cannot take a position on the need for its demolition without knowing all its effects and trends.
“I’m not the type to chain myself somewhere or protest to protect some object. I’m still a scientist who studies trends and their interrelationships.”
“I am not the type to chain myself somewhere or protest to protect some object. In this role, I am still a scientist who studies trends and their interrelationships. Ecology is a science in which there are many lines of relationship and dependence between communities, organisms and individuals,” he says. According to him, what makes his research field interesting are the different connections and the possibility of linking them, for example, with psychology and economics.
Tourism business in Ukraine works and offers research topic
In Ukraine, Reimann worked on various research and development projects even before the start of full-scale Russian aggression. He recalls that at the beginning of the war there was some confusion about the possibility of continuing the research and development projects started. However, he managed to convince skeptics that, in addition to military aid, Ukraine also needs support so that science and tourism can continue to function. He confirms that research and teaching work in Ukrainian universities will continue, including in frontline regions.
It is true that some reorganizations have been unavoidable and a lot of work is being done online. At the same time, contact learning has not disappeared. Reimann recalls that at the beginning of the conflict he gave a lecture to around 50 students in a cloakroom converted into a shelter for the University of Dnipro. However, during the conference, an air disturbance hit the city and suddenly there were 350 listeners.
Sure, the war damaged the tourism sector there, but it still works in its own way. “These humanitarian organizations and political delegations that go to Ukraine bring a decent income to the good hotels in Kiev and to some rural entrepreneurs. Some of them are doing better than before the war,” describes Reimann. It is certainly not entirely traditional tourism, but it still helps this branch of activity to stay alive.
The unshakable belief that the war will end with the victory of Ukraine, and the need to be ready also in the tourism sector, encouraged Reimann and his colleagues from Ukrainian universities to investigate what the future prospects of local tourism businesses are based on to the experiences of other conflict areas, such as Montenegro, Cyprus, Georgia and Vietnam.
In their research, which was published this year as a research article, they focused on regions close to the front of Ukraine and interviewed 144 people working in the field of tourism with the support of the Estonian Research Agency. In addition to the obvious damage and problems resulting from the war, they focused on the future prospects of the industry. Predictably, the local tourism sector has made it a priority to contribute to the reconstruction of the tourism infrastructure destroyed after the war.
Important new knowledge comes from the locals’ expectation that after the war the front areas would offer their guests above all cultural and educational experiences, active holidays, festivals and sporting events, as Reimann and his colleagues learned. The prospect of attracting those interested in learning about the consequences of war atrocities has been viewed with some caution.
The researchers concluded that locals want to make their neighborhood a destination with a positive and bright image, not a place associated with war heritage and tragedies. However, Reimann does not recommend that these regions completely renounce the presentation of the war: unfortunately this will be an important historical heritage of the region that needs and deserves to be exhibited. Furthermore, he helps to balance Russian propaganda, especially among those potential visitors who may come to Ukraine, for example, from China and Turkey.
“The happiest people I have seen here in Ukraine are in the areas close to the war front, they can appreciate that the war has not reached their homes.”
Reimann believes that the field of work in Ukraine is still broad and that the newly published scientific article is only the first exercise of cooperation with Ukrainian colleagues. He stated that a lot has already been discovered in science and it is difficult to invent something completely new. However, both Ukrainian scientists and researchers from other parts of the world are realizing that the current war in Ukraine offers unique opportunities for this purpose.
Mart Reimann definitely intends to continue contributing to science and tourism there, in addition to his academic interest, he is inspired above all by the people, especially in the frontline areas. “The happiest people I have seen here in Ukraine are in the areas close to the war front. They can appreciate the fact that the war has not reached their homes,” Reimann said.
2023-12-29 10:33:00
researcher-rural-and-natural-tourism-in-ukraine-deserves-to-be-explored-and-discovered-scientific-life