Climate Change & Tourism
Background
The growing international awareness about the fast pace of climate change taking place on our planet, together with the impacts that such changes are having on the natural environment, on humans and their economic activities have become evident.
For tourism, climate change is not a remote event, but a phenomenon that already affects the sector and certain destinations in particular, mountain regions and coastal destinations among others. At the same time, the tourism sector is contributing to greenhouse gas emissions (GHG), especially through the transport of tourists.
The impacts of climate change
Climate is an essential resource for tourism, and especially for the beach, nature and winter sport tourism segments. Changing climate and weather patterns at tourist destinations and tourist generating countries can significantly affect the tourists’ comfort and their travel decisions. Changing demand patterns and tourist flows will have impacts on tourism businesses and on host communities, as well as knock off effects on related sectors, such as agriculture, handicrafts or construction.
In small island states and developing countries, where tourism is a major economic activity, any significant reduction in tourist arrivals will have serious employment impacts and generate further poverty.
Awareness
Since the 1st International Conference on Climate Change and Tourism, convened by UNWTO in Djerba, Tunisia in 2003, a growing body of knowledge has been generated addressing the complex relationships between the tourism sector and climate change with important research activities on this subject.
There is now a wide recognition of the urgent need for the tourism industry, national governments and international organizations to develop and implement strategies to face the changing climate conditions and to take preventive actions for future effects, as well as to mitigate tourism’s environmental impacts contributing to climate change. Furthermore, such strategies should take also into account the needs of developing countries in terms of poverty alleviation and other Millennium Development Goals.
Climate Change & Poverty – a coherent strategy
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has called for action on Climate to be taken in close coordination with global action on Poverty Alleviation & the Millennium Development Goals.
UNWTO is committed to ensuring that this coherence is applied to the Tourism sector generally and particularly in regard to the worlds poorest countries, for whom tourism is a driver of jobs, livelihoods, exports and competitiveness.
This was a major aspect of UNWTO’s submission to the Bali Climate Summit.
By UNWTO
