Miguel Van Der Velden explores how tourism operators can spark sustainable innovation - including in sound chemicals and waste management - worldwide.
If there is one scene that exemplifies the last half century in human societal development better than any other, it might well be holiday-goers on a white sandy beach. In the background, a sprawling resort rises like a palace. Palm trees sway in the wind, while children play in the azure waters.
We are so used to the idea of international holidays that most of us do not realize that mass tourism did not exist until just a few decades ago. Since then, the sector has grown exponentially. Worldwide, international tourist arrivals increased more than five-fold in the forty years to 2019.
These numbers made the crash of the tourism sector during the COVID-19 pandemic all the more visible. By the beginning of the pandemic, tourism had become a global phenomenon - and with good reason, it is said that “tourism goes where other sectors don’t” . The sector’s reach means that many of the tourism-related jobs lost due to COVID-19 have been in low-income areas, disproportionately affecting vulnerable demographics.
But even before the pandemic, the benefits of tourism did not come without a cost. Tourism, like many other industries, is a resource-intensive and highly waste-generating business that exemplifies the linear economy. Yet on top of this linear model, tourism has also expanded to remote regions – areas that in many cases lack waste management infrastructure.
Post-pandemic business models
Fortunately, as the tourism sector is recovering, its business model is being reimagined, building on a shift towards new variations of traditional tourism products that were already being explored pre-pandemic. Today, the sector is adapting its marketing strategies to changing trends and envisaging innovative new business models. As such, it is an opportune time to explore what exactly sustainable tourism looks like. In June 2020, the United Nations World Trade Organization (UNWTO) released the One Planet Vision for the Responsible Recovery of the Tourism Sector from COVID-19.
UNWTO calls for “a recovery founded on sustainability, suggesting six lines of action to guide the development and implementation of recovery plans for people, planet and prosperity, namely public health, social inclusion, biodiversity conservation, climate action, circular economy and governance and finance,” says Dr. Dirk Glaesser, Director of Sustainable Development of Tourism at UNWTO. Easy examples of a more sustainable tourism product could be hotels with solar panels or circular grey water systems. The aim of these designs is not only to make buildings more sustainable, but to make tourists more aware of – and more closely connected to – the local environment. But there are economic benefits as well – the cost of electricity can be high in far-flung destinations, and circular systems ensure higher returns on products.
Low-waste, low-impact
Sound chemicals and waste management offers the same opportunities to tourism as renewable energy and wastewater treatment do – such as lower resource use, lower costs, and appeal to environmentally conscious tourists. Additionally, it helps bring tourism closer to other local economic sectors. Host countries may not have the capacity to overhaul waste management systems within a short timeframe – tourism chains, on the other hand, can easily make significant changes to the way their waste is managed.
Iberostar Group, a global tourism and hotel group, made a commitment to send no waste to landfill by 2025. “This means stopping waste from entering the country and ensuring all products have value when they leave our facilities,” the company’s Global Director of Sustainability, Dr. Megan Morikawa, says.
Sound waste management is especially important when it comes to products and materials containing harmful chemicals such as persistent organic pollutants (POPs). POPs are resistant to environmental degradation and often harmful to human health. In the tourism sector, they can be found in everything from hotel walls to television sets, minibars, and air-conditioning units in hotel rooms, and even the taxis that transport tourists to and from their accommodation.
Hotel chains can ensure these products and materials are not released into the environment by reusing equipment. For example, TVs, refrigerators, and other electronic equipment can be refurbished, redistributed, or sold in nearby communities, rather than disposed of.
UNEP is reaching out to the tourism sector to promote the development of tourism products that help regenerate ecosystems and are socially and economically sustainable. Some of these solutions can already be found in the newly launched ISLANDS programme (Implementing Sustainable Low and Non-Chemical Development in Small Island Developing States), which is leveraging $75 million in funding from the Global Environment Facility (GEF) to tackle chemical and waste management across 33 Small Island Developing States globally. As a part of its activities, the programme is working with tourism operators such as Iberostar Group and Carnival Cruise Line to ensure that, where tourism-generated products have to be disposed of, the tourism sector can collaborate on waste management solutions that also helps manage locally produced waste and creates jobs.
Green innovation for sustainable development
“Hotels and resorts can serve as windows to other waste management possibilities. As such, we are reaching out to tourism operators in small island states to find solutions to common waste management issues,” Ludovic Bernaudat from UNEP’s Chemicals and Health Branch, says.
UNEP aims to build on these solutions in the future through the creation of more tourism-specific projects that also tackle biodiversity and climate change issues. By being bold and innovative, hotels and resorts can help local economies bounce back from the pandemic, while also catalyzing a shift towards more sustainable business models. What’s more, finding solutions within the tourism sector can pave the way for more sustainable development within other sectors, first locally, then nationwide.
Rather than seeing holidays as opportunities to forget about our responsibilities, we need to re-imagine them as glimpses into a future that supports local communities and environments.
English writer Samuel Johnson once said of one of the notable attractions of his day: “Worth seeing? Yes; but not worth going to see”. Given the environmental toll of ‘linear’ tourism models, this could long have been said of many destinations. But with a pivot towards environmentally and socially responsible tourism, that answer might finally be changing.
Miguel Van Der Velden is an environmental consultant with a special interest in chemicals and waste management. He is currently pursuing a Master's Degree in climate adaptation governance at the University of Groningen.
