Marine Tourism means business in the West of Ireland

The Marine Institute congratulates Carina Ginty on becoming the first Doctorate Student in the GMIT School of Hotel & Catering.  Carina is developing a model for assessing the economic impact of Marine Tourism activities in the West of Ireland.  Her research will provide valuable insights into marine tourism product development potential in the West of Ireland, and enable a national picture of trends and analysis of the economic importance of water-based tourism.

Over the past two years, Anne Wilkinson, the Institute’s programme manager for water-based tourism and leisure has established a strong supporting research relationship with Carina who has been engaged in a postgraduate masters research study. “Carina is a wonderful role model for applied innovative research in the marine tourism sector.   While it’s widely known that the West of Ireland is rich in marine tourism resources, empirical data and models to actually quantify the impacts of marine tourism in this region are not readily available.  I’m absolutely delighted to hear of Carina’s Fáilte Ireland Research Scholarship award and have no doubt that her in-depth research and analysis will yield positive and practical outputs to underpin marine tourism development in Ireland” says Anne Wilkinson.