Operations Operations
Customer demand driving sustainability
Most global travellers think sustainability is vital for travel, making it an essential component of hotels’ strategies if they want to attract the eco-friendly traveller. Abi Millar speaks to Kevin Brooke, general manager at Heckfi eld Place, and Brune Poirson, chief sustainability offi cer at Accor, about what their hotels are doing to meet environmental demands.
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t was not too long ago that hotel sustainability was treated as a niche concern. For sure, hotel groups paid lip service to the idea, but their sustainability efforts were generally relegated to the back pages of the annual report, and often amounted to little more than a recycling scheme. Few guests made their booking decisions based on a hotel’s green credentials. To say the situation has changed would be an understatement. Over the past few years, but – especially since the start of the pandemic – the average hotel guest has become considerably more eco-conscious.
Booking.com’s 2021 Sustainable Travel Report, which surveyed 29,000 travellers from 30 countries, found that 83% of respondents think sustainable travel is vital, while 61% say the pandemic has made them want to travel more sustainably in future. Over half (53%) admit they get annoyed if a hotel stops them from being sustainable – for example, by failing to provide recycling facilities. Guest demand, then, is driving the need for change – and so too is a general push towards accountability.
Hotel Management International /
www.hmi-online.com
According to the World Travel and Tourism Council, tourism contributes 8–11% of global greenhouse gas emissions, and hotels themselves are responsible for 1%. With emissions continuing to increase, organisations like the Sustainable Hospitality Alliance have quantified what needs to change. Specifically, the industry needs to slash its carbon emissions by two-thirds per room by 2030, and 90% per room by 2050, in order to ensure that industry growth does not come at the detriment of the environment. The upshot is clear – greenwashing is not going to cut it anymore. “Embracing sustainability and putting it at the core of our business model is the only way forward for our industry,” says Brune Poirson, chief sustainability officer at Accor. “First, because few businesses depend on nature as much as travel and tourism companies do. And second, because this is what investors, regulators, guests and owners are expecting from us. However, this is a major challenge as it requires rethinking the way we measure performance, transforming the way we operate our hotels and revamping the way we train people.”
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Accor/Michael Spencer
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