TTG Fairer Travel Sustainability Forum
15th July 2024
On the 11th July both Alison and Alice attended the TTG Fairer Tourism Summit at the Barbican in London. It was a jam-packed day of discussions and presentations from tourism boards, tour operators and organisations who are all working hard to overcome the sustainability issues within the tourism industry.
We had valuable discussion about the challenges of overtourism, an issue that is gaining much media coverage. Susanna Sciacovelli, Director of Tourism Demand and Hospitality at the Mallorca Tourist Board shared insights into how they are dealing with overtourism on the island, with initiatives to extend the season and combat illegal holiday rentals.
We also heard from key industry experts, including Rachel McQueen, UK Managing Director from Destination Canada who shared how they are approaching sustainability and responsible tourism development. She shared their new initiative – The Wealth and Wellbeing Index, a new benchmarking tool that has just been launched to help track and benchmark the economic, social, and environmental sustainability and resilience at all levels for the tourism industry.
Workshops were held after lunch, which were engaging and thought provoking. Alison attended the session “Sustainability as a superpower – here’s how to use it” with Hannah Methven, Sustainability Specialist at Explore Worldwide leading a fascinating discussion with travel agents and tour operators about what sustainability meant in practice to themselves, their business, staff, partners and customers. With ‘progress over perfection’ being the overarching sentiment.
There were also informative talks from Brad West, Head of Partnerships at Travalyst, Rochelle Turner, Global B Corp Impact Manager at Intrepid Travel and Pedro Medina, Deputy Director at the Spanish Tourism Office.
Overall, it was a highly educational event to attend, which enabled us to understand the significant efforts that travel and tourism professionals are taking to deliver sustainability across the sector.
