As reported by: The Scotsman
FORGET golf, whisky and genealogy. Tourism in Scotland is to be boosted by death, homosexuality and gambling.

Niche markets such as dark tourism - interest in graveyards, gruesome ghost tours and battlefields - are to be targeted in an effort to attract more visitors. Industry figures will also hear of the benefits of so-called pink tourism and casino tourism at a series of lectures organised by VisitScotland.

Income from gay visitors and amusement attractions such as Glasgow's casinos is put at more than £100 million annually.

The new niche areas add to existing Scottish tourism themes, including extreme sports, culture, whisky, golf and genealogy. Tens of thousands come to Scotland every year to trace their family history.

A spokesman for VisitScotland said: "Targeting specific areas such as dark tourism and pink tourism are among the ways we can encourage more tourists to Scotland.

"Our research tells us that different markets are interested in different things. American visitors have varied historical interests but Germans are particularly keen on walking holidays, for example. This helps us promote Scotland more effectively to potential new tourists."

The autumn lectures, at VisitScotland's headquarters in Ravelston, Edinburgh, will help workers in Scotland's tourism industry - worth an estimated £4 billion to the national economy - learn from experiences elsewhere.

Professor John Lennon, of the Moffat Centre at Glasgow Caledonian University, a world expert on dark tourism, will speak about "ghosts, murder and religion".

He said: "Scotland has a rich and evocative history and there is scope for expanding the range and quality of attractions in terms of what is on offer.

"But tourism agencies have to walk a tightrope in terms of taste. Some dark tourism is more sinister, such as the interest in going to see Auschwitz, Lockerbie or Ground Zero. It is a similar phenomenon to the desire to slow down and look at accident scenes on the motorway.

"There are more suitable opportunities. The Glasgow Necropolis is a fascinating place to visit but it doesn't get as much attention as perhaps some of the graveyards in Edinburgh which are on ghost tours."

VisitScotland is already appealing to gay travellers, whose higher disposable income - dubbed the pink pound - is worth an estimated £72 million a year to Scotland's hotels, restaurants and bars. A current promotional campaign in glossy magazines with a high gay readership is aimed at reversing the negative publicity earlier this year when Tom Forrest, a Highland B&B owner, turned away gay guests, describing them as "deviants".

VisitScotland is also hosting a series of visits to Scotland by United States tour operators that specialise in the gay market.

Professor Howard Hughes, of Manchester Metropolitan University, will next month talk about marketing to attract the pink pound.

Lady Penelope Cobham, chairman of the British Casino Association (BCA), will deliver a talk in November entitled Casino Tourism - What Lies Ahead?

Glasgow's growth as a business conference destination is being helped by its high-profile casinos. The first of Glasgow's new "super casinos" will open next month in Glassford Street. Run by Gala, the firm which manages four of the city's five existing casinos, it will stay open 18 hours a day.

The creator of Sun City, South Africa's gaming and entertainment resort, is also hoping to spend £162 million creating a casino and hotel complex near the SECC, while one of the giants of the Las Vegas strip, Las Vegas MGM Mirage, has promised "a complete day and night-time experience'' at a proposed casino at the Glasgow Harbour development.

Alan Rankin, chief executive of the Scottish Tourism Forum, said: "If Scotland's tourism operators can gain new ideas from these talks then that's a good thing. Dark tourism is already attracting visitors when you consider the popularity of places such as Inverary Jail and the Bannockburn Visitors' Centre."

A spokeswoman for the Edinburgh and Lothians Tourist Board said attractions such as Mary King's Close and the plethora of Old Town ghost tours were evidence of the spending power of dark tourism.

She said: "Edinburgh could well be described as Scotland's centre of dark tourism. The range of such attractions in the city is huge, from the Edinburgh Dungeon to the National War Museum of Scotland, so dark tourism has a very broad appeal."

Among the other nice niche markets being suggested is cruise-liner tourism.