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tackling the futureINTRODUCTION: Up to 1,000 industry leaders gathered at the World Travel and Tourism Council summit in Dubai last week to consider the challenges ahead. Ian Taylor reports(Travel Weekly Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) Pressure to reduce the industry's environmental footprint dominated discussion at the World Travel and Tourism Council summit. Few doubt the need to act on the issue, but agreement on what to do remains in short supply. Some executives pleaded for a reality check and for the industry to be more assertive in defending itself. Others wanted the sector to lead on the world stage. Marriott International chairman and chief executive Bill Marriott announced he has signed a deal with the Brazilian state of Amazonas to protect the region's rainforest. The group also plans to reduce its energy consumption by 25% over 10 years, he said. "Climate change may be the biggest challenge we face. None of us can afford to say it is not a problem," said Marriott. "Growth in our business must leave as small a footprint as possible." Mandarin Oriental Hotel Group chief executive Edouard Ettedgui told the summit: "It is important not to be in denial about our footprint, but also to recognise the limitations [we face]. The average hotel room produces 30kg of CO2 per night. That costs about $5 [to offset]. Who is going to pay that?" NH Hoteles chief operating officer Francisco Zinser argued hotels have focused too much on guests re-using towels and not enough on independent verification of their environmental claims. "We have misused the trust of the consumer," he said. "We need third-party auditing." Jumeirah Group executive chairman Gerald Lawless argued: "Guests are asking about their carbon footprint and we have to be able to tell them. We are putting metering into hotels to measure the energy use per room. We will pilot this over the next year then work out how to reduce it. Maybe we will offer loyalty points for reduced emissions." Sonu Shivdasani, chairman and chief executive of Six Senses Resorts, argued for the industry to commit to tough targets. "We should be a leader on this. If travel and tourism set a target of halving emissions in five years, we could do it. We need tough goals." Lawless disagreed: "We should also be talking about sustainability of employment," he said. "Employment has to be part of our measurability. Our industry employs 10% of the world's workforce. Do we want that to go down? Or should we say we want to increase it to 12%? That is achievable." Costas Christ, chairman of the judges of the WTTC's Tourism for Tomorrow Award, argued: "If we turned off travel and tourism it would be an ecological disaster. You can trace the success of eco-projects funded by tourism. But the US uses 40% of world resources and that is a model that cannot be sustained. In travel we also have a model that in some ways cannot be sustained." He suggested the industry donate $1 for every flight towards protecting the remaining forest areas in the Amazon, Congo and Papua New Guinea. Manchester airport group chief executive Geoff Muirhead pleaded for a sense of realism while attacking calls for governments to leave the industry to regulate itself. "The industry is greedy and selfish," he said. "We are driven by profit and cannot be arbiters of our environmental impact. The emphasis for business is to make money. Governments have to provide the framework." He added: "Saving energy is obvious - fewer emissions mean lower costs. But offsetting emissions is about the rich bribing poor nations in order to carry on as we are. We need to reduce consumption." Montenegro minister of tourism and environment Predrag Nenezic agreed: "More and more governments are merging departments of tourism and the environment because there can be no sustainable tourism without care for the environment. We have to regulate." poverty in the spotlight Poverty vied with the environment as a priority for some World Travel and Tourism Council delegates, along with the failure to spread the income from tourism more widely in poorer destinations. Mandarin Oriental Hotel Group chief executive Edouard Ettedgui said: "The environment is mainly a problem for future generations - poverty is a problem now. People are ?dying as we speak." South African Tourism chairman and chief executive Jabu Mabuza said: "Tourism is an important economic driver. In South Africa we are required to generate more tourists and save energy. The WTTC predicts tourism will double by 2020 and we want a share of that." "But growth on its own does not alleviate poverty. Income needs to be shared." Serena Hotels Africa managing director Mahmud Jan Mohamed said: "There is a perception that tourism is for the rich and for foreign investors. "The industry has to play a much greater role in ensuring income spreads through communities in the developing world. Fragile and sensitive areas will not survive without that. The media can help by highlighting where things go wrong in spreading wealth to local communities." Mohamed suggested tour operators should insist on income being dispersed more widely when contracting in destinations. He said: "The major tour operators only look at the right product and the right price. Our biggest challenge is to convince major suppliers to look at sustainable product and spreading wealth. "Corruption in the developing world is also a challenge. We have to play a much more hands-on role in bringing discipline to this area. Not enough emphasis is given to corporate social responsibility or transparency. Newsweek Middle East editor Christopher Dickey went further, suggesting the trend towards all-inclusive resorts in the developing world was unsustainable. "Tourism in developing countries tends to be enclave tourism - keeping tourists beyond a wall," he said. "Tourism that is about isolating people, building walls that exclude local people and make them feel excluded, is a problem. "There is a tendency for tourism enterprises in developing countries to get a deal with the government and forget about the people. But these governments are [often] not stable." Arthur de Haast, chief executive of hotel investment services firm Jones Lang La Salle Hotels, agreed: "That is fair. The benefits [of tourism] are not really going to the local population. There are not enough examples of where this is working." Credit crunch begins to bite The deteriorating state of the economy is putting a break on industry growth, with a leading hotel investor warning capital spending halved in the first three months of this year. Deutsche Bank chief economist Norbert Walter told the summit: "The world is in very different shape to 12 months ago. The US is close to recession, Japan is suffering, the UK economy is so-so and not all emerging economies are in good shape." Jones Lang La Salle Hotels chief executive Arthur de Haast said: "The biggest short-term risk is a shortage of capital. The volume of investment in the hotel industry fell more than 50% in the first quarter of this year [compared with 2007]. The change is acute." De Haast said the economic pressures on governments could lead to decisions that would also adversely affect the industry. Mandarin Oriental Hotel Group chief executive Edouard Ettedgui agreed, but added: "The credit crunch is slowing growth, but the biggest risk is overcapacity. The greatest risk to the industry is that there are too many hotel rooms." Walter said social tensions would further impact on economic growth and tourism. "China has the Olympics, but all now look at this with apprehension," he said. "Social issues are increasingly important and intolerance is growing. Many countries do not pay the world market price for scarce commodities. Fuel is expensive. Food is expensive. A number of countries are developing social tensions." He added: "If you have revenue or costs in differing currencies, either you hedge [against exchange-rate changes] or you are dead. You can never have a margin high enough to cope with the fall in the dollar." However, Marriott International chairman and chief executive Bill Marriott said: "I've been through six recessions and it is important to remember we will come through. After September 11 we were concerned whether travel would ever get back to sunny days. Well we did. Travel accounts for 10% of world GDP." Copyright ? 2008 Reed Business Information - UK. All Rights Reserved. |