This is the first component of a series exploring what sustainable coastal and marine tourism will look like in 2030 and 2050, and the 3 key adjustments needed until 2025 to achieve this ambitious vision. As pandemic restrictions are gradually lifted in peak coastal regions, millions of tourists will flock to their favorite beach destinations this summer. Tourism remains an effective and familiar way for other people to connect with nature. While a healthy ocean is unequivocally the cornerstone of high-quality tourism experiences, the largest contributor market-based areas of investment and a tool to gain advantages from local communities and businesses, the dominant technique for mass tourism does not take into account nature, with devastating effects. Consequences on the marine habitat and its wildlife.
With more than 1400 million foreign travelers traveling around the world before the pandemic, according to the United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO)[1], the prospect of tourism as a hard and transformative force for sustainable progress is significant. In 2019, the tourism sector was the third largest in terms of exports, one of the fastest growing, the largest employer and one of the main critical drivers of economic expansion through job and business creation, export earnings and infrastructure progress. This trend is expected to resume when the pandemic ends. Back
There is no healthy ocean without sustainable coastal and marine hiking on a scale that meets customer demand. Well-managed hiking can contribute to conservation while contributing to sustainable progress and offers a source of income opportunities and a higher quality of life for coastal communities. By 2030, have a chance to get it right. After all, it is in the interest of the tourism industry; nature is your most important trading partner. Hotels, cruise ships, tour operators and the industry’s long and wide chain of sources all have beautiful destinations for their long-term advertising health. The vision of the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) for the next decade is to make a contribution with our conservation partners to nature-friendly hiking where all actors in the chain of origin converge to create price for people, nature and the companies. This technique has been framed through the Sustainable Development Goals of the United Nations and the industry and the criteria and principles established through the World Sustainable Tourism Council (GSTC).
Since its inception, WWF has partnered with the industry. Industry companies are increasingly aware of the competing desires in a given seascape, how habitat loss and climate replacement are linked in detail, and the transformative role industry can play in restoration and recovery. better resilience of the oceans.
It starts with moving from a “do no harm first” mentality to a net contribution to other people and the planet. This requires a holistic technique that leverages existing movements to protect places, provides access to financing for sustainable tourism businesses, and ensures that policies are co-created with and ultimately gain advantages for indigenous, other people, and local communities.
Moving towards nature-friendly tourism
The first replacement to be carried out will be structural, integrating sustainable tourism into the 30×30 ambitions of the High Ambition Coalition for Nature and People[2]. Area-based conservation interventions should be integrated, holistic and intelligence-based. results for other local people, global society and nature. The sovereignty of local communities and other indigenous people over their herbal seascapes should be codified through conservation plans co-created in spaces where tourism, nature and other people coexist. Therefore, corporations have to work in synergy and form teams with communities directly affected by coastal advances and tourism activities. This deserves to come with integrating the principles of sustainability and resilience into the life cycle of infrastructure projects. This vision is also largely based on obtaining better tourism control systems. , adding capacity building, schooling and inclusion of travelers, the personal sector and the local community. Ties.
The change of moment is perceptive, moving from mass tourism replaced to sustainable and restorative tourism. Mindsets across the tourism source chain also deserve to change to see wildlife coverage as the most productive spouse for ocean tourism. In the first major study on global wildlife tourism, researchers from the University of Oxford’s Wildlife Conservation Research Unit concluded that up to 40% of global tourism is wildlife tourism across seascapes and landscapes[3]. billions of dollars for the tourism industry. In this regard, a sustainable blue economy globally and in many spaces remains one of the most vital livelihood turbines and a physically powerful driving force for local economies. Sustainable tourism is expected to improve governance in protected areas and cooperation between control bodies and local actors for greater mutual economic and environmental benefit
The third substitution will have to come from finances. Tourism can be big business and is made imaginable through capital flows from money markets. In 2019 alone, before the pandemic, tourism accounted for $948 billion in capital investment, or 4. 3% of total global investment that year[4]. These monetary flows will need to be aligned with a sustainable blue economy to minimise short-, medium- and long-term risks, such as those arising from climate substitution and environmental degradation.
Financiers, in addition to banks and investors, urgently want to adopt and enforce the financing principles of the sustainable blue economy and its related consulting lines[5]. This consultant has evolved into key sectors, adding the transition to sustainable marine and coastal tourism, to working with clients and portfolio corporations to shift practices towards positive outcomes for nature. In addition, local tourism businesses and communities protect herbarium capital and social team spirit want equitable and sustainable resources of capital to grow and incentives for long-term control of herbarium resources. .
An example of this in Latin America, where the Inter-American Development Bank announced a challenge in collaboration with UNWTO to finance the progression of sustainable tourism that brought innovation for environmental sustainability and employment. Among the corporations that have secured investment through the challenge is the Green Fins Global Hub, which aims to help small maritime tourism businesses in Costa Rica and the Dominican Republic achieve higher environmental standards. Another company, Experience Nariva in Trinidad and Tobago, aims to encourage ecotourism in Ramsar-protected Narira Marsh to gain advantages from local communities and create incentives for smart environmental management.
These 3 adjustments cannot be achieved if policies do not adhere to urgent wishes and anticipate long-term disruptions in nature conservation and the tourism industry. Appropriate policies can enable new and desirable directions, stimulate innovation and address demanding situations and problems.
[1] UNWTO. ” International tourist arrivals reach 1. 4 billion two years ahead of schedule”, January 2019. https://www. unwto. org/global/press-release/2019-01-21/international-tourist-arrivals-success in-14-billion-two-year forecast
[2] High Ambition Coalition. https://www. hacfornatureandpeople. org/home
[3] PLOS ONE. ” The visitor is not right – Implications for the conservation and welfare of animals of the developing call for animal tourism” https://journals. plos. org/plosone/article?id=10. 1371/journal. phone. 0138939
[4] IISD. ” Tourism recovery and resilience in small Commonwealth states: driving circular economy pathways after COVID-19. “https://www. iisd. org/articles/tourism-recovery-resilience-commonwealth-small-states-circular -economy
[5] United Nations Environment Programme Financial Initiative, Turning the Tide: How to Finance a Sustainable Ocean Recovery, March 2021, https://www. unepfi. org/publications/turning-the-tide/.