THE World Green Tourism, a three-day conference and exhibition that took place in Abu Dhabi, UAE threw emphasis on the importance of sustainability in all sectors of the Middle East travel industry. The show opened announcing that a new kind of sustainable tourism can help protect the UAE’s cultural heritage.
Razan Khalifa Al Mubarak, secretary general of the Environment Agency, Abu Dhabi (EAD), told an audience of global experts and travel trade professionals that the tourism and hospitality sector has a crucial role to play in reducing the nation’s footprint and combating climate change.
He said “Abu Dhabi has a fantastic natural heritage with a real mix of geology, habitats and species, on land and in the sea. Several million birds each year pass through Abu Dhabi on their migration from the heart of Asia southwards to Africa, or eastwards to India or beyond. Given these natural assets and their importance to the cultural identity of the UAE, there is a world of opportunity for a new kind of tourism in Abu Dhabi that not only raises awareness on the unique biodiversity of the Emirate, but can also play a role in celebrating and safeguarding the cultural heritage of its people.
She added: “Creating jobs and building capacity amongst locals to manage our natural assets so that we can see not just a growth in tourism but in sustainable eco-tourism is equally important.”
Held under the patronage of Sheikh Sultan bin Tahnoon Al Nahyan, chairman of Abu Dhabi Tourism Authority (ADTA), World Green Tourism is designed to inspire the Middle East travel industry to place a bigger emphasis on sustainability.
The opening day of the conference programme was devoted to practical steps for the travel and tourism industry to “green” their operations and make their businesses more sustainable. Moderated by Professor Geoffrey Lipman, a world authority on green tourism, the first of a series of panel debates dealt with the question of how can large scale tourism ever be made sustainable, and whether the industry’s large players are doing enough. The speakers were Amr Abdel Ghaffer, regional director for the Middle, East, UNWTO, Ruth Holroyd, group head of sustainability, The Thomas Cook Group, Prof. Harold Goodwin, director, International Centre for Responsible Tourism and Hisham Zaazou, Egypt’s senior assistant Minister of Tourism.
The Honourable Maurice F. Strong, Senior Advisor to the 2012 Rio+20 Summit was named as the first recipient of the inaugural World Green Tourism Award in recognition of his pivotal role in shaping the global sustainable development agenda and in recognising the potential of Travel & Tourism to make a contribution to mainstream green growth transformation.
Among his many public and private sector appointments, Strong has served as secretary general of the 1972 Stockholm Environment Conference, and as the first head of the UN Environment Programme. In 1992, he was secretary general of the Rio Earth Summit, the United Nations conference on environment and development. During the Rio Conference, he proposed an “Agenda 21 for Travel & Tourism.” This became the basic framework for global programmes by the World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC) and UNWTO to start the development of a travel and tourism sector that was environmentally, socially, and culturally sustainable.