Bornholm’s off-season tourism growth offsets summer decline
The number of overnight stays on Bornholm grew marginally in 2024, but more visitors outside of the summer season and an increase in the number of visitors from non-core markets suggests that the island’s second-largest industry may be poised for growth in the years to come.
End-of-year statistics published by Destination Bornholm, the island’s tourism board, show the number of overnight stays rose at an annual rate of 0.1% in 2024, to 1,691,257.
Denmark and Germany remained the two largest markets for Bornholm’s 4.1 billion kroner (€550 million) tourism industry. Though fewer Danes and Germans are visiting during the July-August high season, the decline has been somewhat made up by an increase in the number of visitors in shoulder seasons. The result is a tourism season that now spans from March to December.
Destination Bornholm highlighted significant—if small—increases in the numbers of visitors from emerging markets, including France, Italy, the UK and America, that it reckons could make up for the high-season decline.
For mariners in the Baltic Sea plagued by disrupted satellite-navigation systems, help is on its way in the form of a forgotten technology. Sjöfartsverket, the Swedish maritime authority, will equip a total of ten lighthouses on Sweden’s south-eastern coast, starting with Kapelludden (pictured above), with what is known as a radar beacon, a system that, in short, emits a Morse-code signal when it receives a radar signal. Navigators who receive the signal can then determine their ship’s location from the bearing and distance to the beacon.
Sweden, like other countries in the Baltic, points to Russia as the source of disruptions to satnav systems used not just by ships, but also aeroplanes, and research has shown the signal that causes the them is strongest near Kaliningrad. Regardless of who is to blame, it is a growing problem. Mariners say it is a regular occurrence, and perhaps tens of thousands of ships in one of the world’s busiest maritime areas have been affected. Fortunately, navigators can still find their way with other methods, including navigational charts on paper. They require more effort to use—and often additional training—but they are also harder to disrupt. Necessity is also the mother of re-invention.
(📸 Stefan Svanaeus)
Mention Bornholm to any Dane, and they will immediately think of summer. That is a problem for an island that is looking to promote itself as a place to visit year-round. So far, efforts to promote winter tourism—including a pledge by shopkeepers to stay open throughout the off-season—have sputtered. Zero in on December, though, and Christmas, at least, is beginning to look a lot like a success story. The success of Bornholm’s Christmas markets, though relatively new, can already be read in the statistics: since 2021, when Destination Bornholm, the municipally funded tourism bureau, began marketing them to people on the mainland, the number of overnight says for November and December have doubled.
Bornholm’s markets have neither the size nor the history of those held elsewhere, but, say attendees, that is precisely their draw. The focus, instead, is on quality; locally produced handicrafts are the main fare. Group Bornholm, a tourism agency, this year organised its first tour for Germans to visit the island’s Christmas markets. Most of the thirty people along on the sold-out trip had rave reviews for the smaller scale and intimacy of the island’s markets, and many said they would be interested in seeing the island at another time of year. This will not be the last Christmas for Bornholm’s markets.
(📸 Toxophilus)
Denmark’s culture ministry has named the town of Svaneke (pop 1,000) on the island of Bornholm, as one the country’s best-preserved examples of its built heritage. In all, 16 places ranging from entire villages to the centre of Copenhagen, all of them dating from the Middle Ages to the 19th century, were selected as examples of how historic areas can retain their distinct characteristics, while also functioning as modern inhabited areas. The designations are meant to be an inspiration for other places in Denmark from the same time period. For the 16 sites that made the list, the local councils that are responsible for them will be required to place preservation on par with development when making decisions about them.
Some towns might see that as a threat, but, for Svaneke, it is a relief and a recognition of the work local groups have put into keeping the town looking much the same as it did in the 19th century—to the extent that the owners of homes whose chimneys had been removed by past owners were at one point told to add one, even if it served no function. Their fervour and attention to detail has already been twice honoured: first in 1975, by the Council of Europe, and again in 2014 by Danes in a popular vote to find the country’s prettiest market town.
When the European award was given, Palle Lauring, a popular historian, said of the town’s efforts, “the people of Svaneke were satisfied that their town was as it was.” Apparently, visitors have been too. Svaneke is the most visited town on Bornholm, and Bornholm is Denmark’s biggest tourism destination. That can make Svaneke a crowded place during the high season, but, those who come say it is a nice place to visit because people want to live there.
(📸 A Savin)
Seven countries in the Nordic-Baltic region have agreed to pool their resources to stave off cyberattacks. Funded by the EU, hosted by Denmark, and with the participation of Estonia, Finland, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania and Norway, the Nordic-Baltic Cyber Consortium will serve as a means for national cyber-security agencies in the seven countries to share information and to work together to develop new ways to counter cyberthreats.
The threat of cyberattack is not unique to the Baltic region, but the countries taking part in the consortium are among the most digitalised in the world, and thus particularly at risk. One strategy to protect themselves would be to take their foot off the pedal and move some services offline again, but that would mean losing many of the efficiency gains digitialisation has created, especially in the public sector. Doing so would also spoil plans to roll out artificial intelligence. By doubling down on digitalisation, they have decided that what makes them vulnerable is also what can make them stronger.
Employees of LRT, the Lithuanian public broadcaster, began a three-day protest today as members of the Seimas opened discussion of a law that would make it easier to dismiss its director-general. Some 1,500 journalists and cultural figures gathered to raise alarm that the measure—which comes on the heels of a decision to reverse a planned 11% budget increase over the next three years—is an attack on LRT’s independence and an encroachment on free speech.
Earlier in the month, 10,000 people gathered for a similar protest, and many Lithuanians say hamstringing LRT puts Lithuania on a path already laid out in Hungary, Slovakia and Poland. That is indeed bad company, but the reality is that public broadcasters throughout Europe have come under increased political scrutiny. Cases such as the BBC’s misleading editing of a Donald Trump speech adds fuel to the critics’ fire, but the big scandals are rare, and, indeed, their reporting is deemed as being critical, fair and necessary by both the public and experts alike. No wonder why the lawmakers are irritated.
A frequent topic of discussion on Bornholm is the island’s declining population. Despite efforts to attract new residents, more islanders die or move off the island each year than can be replaced by birth or in-migration. One bright spot has been the number of foreigners coming to the island to work. One in eight jobs is held by a non-Dane; in 2008, it was one in 30. That is the largest per-capita increase in Denmark in the period, and it was enough to help the island keep its workforce stable.
The typical foreigner still works in hospitality or agriculture—where they have all but become indispensable for firms—but the shrinking workforce means there are a growing number of opportunities for them in a broader range of fields. There may be soon be new jobs where their labour will be needed: Energy Island Bornholm, a power-converter for offshore wind energy, is expected to create some 1,500 temporary construction jobs, and then perhaps 1,000 permanent jobs running, maintaining and serving the facility. As yet, the energy island is only a proposal, but the workforce it will need is already charging up.
Rail Baltica—the multi-billion‑euro, European‑gauge rail line linking Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania with the rest of the EU—remains on schedule for completion in 2030, the prime ministers from the three countries said on Friday. Meeting in Rīga, they provided a status report for the project and pledged that they would devote the time and money needed for it to be completed (and promised to get as much EU funding as they could get their hands on).
The unwavering backing for the project is a reassurance; the problem is that it is necessary at all. All major infrastructure construction goes over time and over budget, but Rail Baltica is more than a matter of prestige. Like their decoupling from the Russian power grid earlier this year, its construction reiterates to Moscow that the Baltics are EU territory and would make it harder for the Kremlin to bring them back into its sphere of influence. Reports that Latvia was considering saving money by retaining the Russian gauge on its part of the railway may just have been rumour, but the seriousness of the situation cannot be exaggerated.
(📸 Inga Ruginienė)
The European Commission has released its set of proposals for helping EU members to move some of the union’s most important energy projects forward. The measures were first aired in September by Ursula von der Leyen, the commission’s president, as a way to speed up projects that can make Europe’s energy net more resilient and—consumers will like this—its power cheaper.
In addition to cutting paperwork, the European Grids Package and the Energy Highways initiative will increase the amount of funding Brussels is willing to make available to big energy projects five-fold, to €30 billion. Ms von der Leyen had already identified the Harmony Link, connecting the Baltic states to Poland, and Energy Island Bornholm, an energy project that could serve as blue-print for hugely ambitious energy projects, as two of her eight highways towards the union’s power needs. Yesterday, she put the pedal to the metal.
Estonia’s Riigikogu has approved a phased-in reduction the tax it charges online casinos. Reducing the rate to 4% of gross revenue, from the current 6% is in keeping with the country’s efforts to cultivate a well-regulated offshore gambling industry. A previous proposal would have raised the rate a percentage point, but supporters in the government, led by Tanel Tein, worried that doing so would scare off potential investors.
Opponents fret that cutting the tax without any guarantees that the industry will see its revenues grow means Tallinn risks having less money for culture and sport. Critics also warn that more betting increases the risk that Estonia’s online casinos will be exploited by money launderers. Mr Tein managed to sell the lower rate by labelling it a “pro-growth pivot”, but dissenters within the government said only voted for it because of his threats to dissolve the government if they did not get in line. His high-stakes bid has paid off, for now.
Finnair has cancelled its evening flight from Helsinki to Vilnius until March. The decision, taken on Wednesday, came after two other airlines said they would move their evening flights to earlier in the day. The reason: repeated airspace restrictions over Vilnius Airport in recent months caused by weather balloons sent over the border with Belarus.
Smugglers have used high-altitude weather balloons have to carry cigarettes into Lithuania since at least 2021. Last year alone, some 1.4 million cigarettes were confiscated. But officials say the timing and the direction of the current wave suggest it is a deliberate effort by the Belarusian government to disrupt air traffic.
In October and November, the airspace over Vilnius airport was closed 14 times due to balloon sightings. Kaunas Airport, the country’s second busiest, has also been closed. Only about 5% of all travellers in and out of Vilnius during the period were affected by the closures, but the number of balloons reported has continued to rise, and the airport was closed twice in the past week because of them.
Belarus says the balloons are Lithuania’s problem. The airlines are doing what they can to make that the case.