ORIGINAL PAPER Long-term trends in tourism climate index scores for 40 stations across Iran: the role of climate change and influence on tourism sustainability Gholamreza Roshan 1 & Robabe Yousefi 1 & Jennifer M. Fitchett 2 Received: 11 January 2015 /Revised: 23 March 2015 /Accepted: 24 April 2015 # ISB 2015 Abstract Tourism is a rapidly growing international sector and relies intrinsically on an amenable climate to attract visi- tors. Climate change is likely to influence the locations pre- ferred by tourists and the time of year of peak travel. This study investigates the effect of climate change on the Tourism Climate Index (TCI) for Iran. The paper first calculates the monthly TCI for 40 cities across Iran for each year from 1961 to 2010. Changes in the TCI over the study period for each of the cities are then explored. Increases in TCI are ob- served for at least one station in each month, whilst for some months no decreases occurred. For October, the maximum of 45 % of stations demonstrated significant changes in TCI, whilst for December only 10 % of stations demonstrated change. The stations Kashan, Orumiyeh, Shahrekord, Tabriz, Torbat-e-Heidarieh and Zahedan experienced significant in- creases in TCI for over 6 months. The beginning of the change in TCI is calculated to have occurred from 1970 to 1980 for all stations. Given the economic dependence on oil exports, the development of sustainable tourism in Iran is of importance. This critically requires the identification of locations most suitable for tourism, now and in the future, to guide strategic investment. Keywords Tourism climate index . Climate change . Iran . Mann-Kendall test . Climate suitability Introduction The selection of a tourism destination is a decision which is inherently influenced by the local climate (Morgan et al. 2000; Maddison 2001; Perch-Nielsen et al. 2010). Leisure tourism is predominated by decisions which primarily involve the cli- mate of the destination, with clear skies and warm tempera- tures providing a significant draw-card to visitors of coastal locations, whilst prolonged periods of snow cover are required for skiing (Elsasser and Burki 2002; Hamilton et al. 2005; Burns and Bibbings 2009). Climate dictates the potential for various types of recreation activities, whilst the weather and its associated season controls the periods of peak occupancy (Amelung et al. 2007; Perch-Nielsen et al. 2010). This is par- ticularly the case for business, educational and cultural tour- ism, which whilst less dependent on optimal climate, is tem- porally influenced by seasons of optimal climate (Miekzowski 1985; Amelung et al. 2007). For these tourism purposes, where two locations of similar cultural or educational value exist, that which boasts a more attractive climate is more often selected (Miekzowski 1985). The significance of the role of climate in determining the timing and location of tourist pref- erence results in tourist destinations and tourism accommoda- tion establishments prospering when they can use the local climate to their advantage (Belen Gomez Martin 2005; Perch-Nielsen et al. 2010). Furthermore, given the flexibility which tourists have to select different tourist destinations over long periods, and to change their accommodation bookings over short periods, the role of any weather or climate changes in tourist location or timing preference are felt more severely by the tourism accommodation establishment than by tourists (Hein et al. 2009). Critical in the success of such endeavours to maximise tourism potential through the local climate, is the capacity to predict, and adapt to, future climate changes in the particular region, and for the tourism sector to identify key * Gholamreza Roshan ghr.roshan@gu.ac.ir 1 Department of Geography, Golestan University, Shahid Beheshti, 49138-15759 Gorgan, Iran 2 School of Geography, Archaeology and Environmental Studies, University of the Witwatersrand, Private Bag 3, Wits 2050, Johannesburg, South Africa Int J Biometeorol DOI 10.1007/s00484-015-1003-0