MANCHESTER AIRPORT


Roadmap to Recovery Travel Weekly webcasts: This week’s guest speakers focused on travel c FUTURE OF TOURISM COALITION


Jeremy Sampson


Travel


Weekly’s Ian Taylor


Brad Miller


Travel Weekly’s Lucy Huxley


Airport chief spells out priorities for government


C


ertainty for the travel industry is the number-one ask of government, according


to the boss of Manchester airport. Speaking before the government


confirmed the introduction of travel corridors, Brad Miller, chief operating officer at Manchester airport, said the industry could “take care of itself” once restrictions were lifted. “Even the limited air bridges will


give people confidence that it is safe to fly – and it is,” he said. “If we can all get revenues flowing


back anywhere close to what they were pre-Covid-19, the industry will largely be able to take care of itself. “So, giving us some certainty


would be the absolute number-one priority from government. “Lift quarantine without delay,


even if that’s with a risk-based approach, to get people flying again. “And open up air bridges, but give


us some rules and regulations and guidance that we can interpret, and that consumers can understand, to give them certainty about booking with confidence.”


12 2 JULY 2020 Miller said the airport’s role


in lobbying for the removal of quarantine and the introduction of air corridors had been “huge”. But he was not confident air bridges to long-haul destinations were imminent, despite “massive pent-up demand” for transatlantic flying. Manchester is trialling a long-


lasting sanitising product in high-traffic areas and non-mandatory thermal- imaging technology to detect travellers with high temperatures as it prepares to reopen for international travel. Miller said the airport “is totally


safe and secure”, adding: “We always looked at safety and security pre- Covid-19, but even more so now.” He said passengers using the


airport would “see some different things”, such as all staff wearing face masks, gloves and face shields, plus Perspex screens and new ‘mock scanners’ for passengers to test if their bag will get through security. Miller also confirmed the


airport was trialling several types of temperature-testing technology, even though the equipment has not been made mandatory by the government.


Paloma Zapata


Sustainability experts call for shift away from growth


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ix of the world’s leading sustainable tourism organisations aim no longer “to be side-lined”


by mainstream travel but to put sustainability at the core of Covid-19 recovery efforts. The Travel Foundation,


Sustainable Travel International, the Center for Responsible Travel, the Destination Stewardship Center, Green Destinations and Tourism Cares set up the Future of Tourism Coalition last month. Jeremy Sampson, chief executive


of the Travel Foundation, said: “We don’t want to be just a bunch of side-lined organisations shouting in the wind. We want a strong voice.” Sustainable Travel International


chief executive Paloma Zapata said: “We need different metrics to measure success [in tourism]. It can’t just be volume, volume, volume and not take stock of the cost of creating that volume. Tourism encompasses everything from the infrastructure impact to community impact, nature, the environment and ecosystems.”


Now is the time to


build more-sustainable businesses that are able to withstand shocks


Sampson suggested that, prior to


the pandemic, “there was some real progress in people understanding that the industry could not continue in the way it was”. But he suggested travel had failed to support NGOs to the extent some other industries had. Noting the industry operates


in “extremely tourism-dependent countries”, he said: “Understandably, there will be a desire to get things going again. But what the problem was before, and will be again, is that destinations do not have the capacity, the tools or the mandate to deal with the implications of growth.” Zapata added: “Now is the time to


build more-sustainable businesses and destinations that are able to withstand shocks – because more of these shocks will come. Climate change and future pandemics are real threats.”


travelweekly.co.uk


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