BUSINESS NEWS stics to travel’s impacts’
dation chief Salli Felton tells Ian Taylor Plastics are a
massive problem, but removing them should be part of a much bigger programme
One option, she suggests, would
be to establish a trust fund into which companies would pay a share of their profits, with money going “to provide funding for countries where it does not exist, to help destinations develop the skills to manage their assets”. Part of the problem is that many
destinations “simply don’t have the skills for destination management. Marketing is their focus,” she said. “Managing destination impacts
requires a whole different set of skills and knowledge. These need to be developed to have the right people in place to advise on reducing resource use and setting clear standards.”
‘Overtourism flags other issues’ Felton warned that without extensive industry-wide action, “it is going to end up with regulation – but regulation at a country level [because] international standards can be difficult to apply.” “Overtourism is flagging the
issues,” she said. “We know there are problems in Venice, in Dubrovnik, in Barcelona, but these are better placed to deal with the problems than a small village where tourists take a selfie, leave their rubbish and go. “If we just look at the symptoms
and say, ‘Let’s restrict cruise ships going into Dubrovnik’, it simply moves the problem somewhere else.” The underlying issue, she
suggests, is that: “We look only at
travelweekly.co.uk
economic impacts, not social and environmental impacts. Tourism is not alone in having this problem, but tourism impacts build and you don’t know the real impacts until too late.” The Travel Foundation published
a study exploring the hidden costs of the sector, entitled Destinations at Risk: The Invisible Burden of Tourism, in March last year. It warned the industry is “on a shaky foundation” and tourism would “become increasingly difficult to manage” in many destinations. Produced with sustainability
consultancy EplerWood International and Cornell University of the US, the report concluded the industry’s rapid growth is “leading to damage in destinations [that] lowers the economic benefits of tourism”. Felton describes the report as “the beginning of a long piece of work” to which The Travel Foundation and her successor Jeremy Sampson are committed. She said: “No one has answers,
but we want to see the industry better understand tourism practice and change it, so destinations move away from simply marketing to look at destination management and how to build capacity in tourism.” Felton insisted: “There is an
appetite for this among destinations and companies that care about the nature of their business. Tourism has the potential to destroy destinations and the industry, [but] consumers are starting to wake up and ask questions, and companies are starting to realise they need to be able to answer questions in this area.” For now, Felton has returned to
Australia to be with her family. But she said: “I won’t stay away from sustainable tourism. I couldn’t.”
Salli Fenton 9 JANUARY 2020 79
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