WTTC to Collaborate with UNWTO and the Sustainable Hospitality Alliance

During COP15 in Montreal today, the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC), United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) and the Sustainable Hospitality Alliance announced a new collaboration which will bring together the public and private sectors in a shared vision to halt and reverse biodiversity loss by 2030.

The vision sees the global Travel & Tourism sector supporting and inspiring governments, businesses, and society to implement the post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework and help to transform our relationship with the natural world.

Signatories to the vision have committed to adopt a nature positive approach to tourism through integrating biodiversity safeguards by reducing carbon emissions, the impact of pollution, the unsustainable use of resources, and by protecting and restoring nature and its wildlife.

This collaboration follows the release of WTTC's 'Nature Positive Travel & Tourism' report, which was created jointly with ANIMONDIAL, and focuses on halting and reversing damage to nature so the living world can recover from its current depleted state. This involves minimizing ongoing harm and taking positive action to restore nature to produce an overall benefit to biodiversity and help achieve Net Zero.

Almost 150 organizations have signed up for the vision so far including international hotel groups, tour operators, travel agents, destinations, and international wildlife charities.

Complementing the power of the private sector, UNWTO, as the voice of tourism at the global governance level, will work to bring governments and international organizations on board and announce the shared vision of tourism as a pillar of wildlife conservation and habitat protection.

Progress will also be guided by UNWTO's trusted data and analysis, including the groundbreaking Measuring the Sustainability of Tourism (MST) initiative and its growing International Network of Sustainable Tourism Observatories (INSTO).

The vision forecasts a future where governments implement policies that integrate biodiversity safeguards throughout their operations and the supply chain. The vision will also enable the sector to take action to avoid or minimize negative impacts on nature and play a proactive role in the protection and restoration of biodiversity.

Integral to this will be an enhanced recognition of the importance of clean oceans for the sector, with around 40% of the global 'Blue Economy' related to tourism, according to UNWTO data.