Collection

Part of

Texel as Host

2. Current socio-technical system

Texel is a small island in the Dutch Waddenzee, where each year in summer every second person on a island is a tourist. This puts a lot of strain onto the natural resources of the island. The local people, or Texelaars, live quite an environmentally friendly life. They are used to the limited resources and are very proud of the beautiful nature on the island, so they do quite a lot to sustain the environment.

Presence of tourists on the island however, means that they needed more resources from the 'overkant'(mainland): the other side of the Waddenzee. They needed to import fresh water and food in order to satisfy the needs of the island population.

However, the tourist sector now makes up about 80% of Texels income.

This situation challenges the people on Texel and involves economic, ecological and socio-cultural challenges.