Good news in tourism July 5 – 11, 2020

… because it’s every­one’s business! 

Pub­lished every Sunday, “Good news in tour­ism” is the per­fect pick-me-up for the start of a new week in travel & tourism. 

This week in “Good news …”:

• COVID ops
• Region­al co-ops
• Decar­bon­ising transport
• Cul­tur­al her­it­age tourism
• Eco- & nature-based tourism
• Friends indeed
• Odds & ends

It’s “Good Tour­ism”. And go!

Import­ant “GT” news first:

A travel entre­pren­eur pas­sion­ate about storytelling and social good, Kel­ley Louise is the founder and chief of Impact Travel Alli­ance, a com­munity for eco- and socially-con­scious trav­el­lers. In a fresh“Good Tour­ism” Insight pub­lished Fri­day, Kel­ley tells us how the not-for-profit is mak­ing the best of chal­len­ging times to edu­cate trav­el­lers. Thanks to “GT” Insight Part­ner Second Look World­wide for invit­ing Kel­ley to contribute.

“GT” Insight Part­ner the World Tour­ism Asso­ci­ation for Cul­ture & Her­it­age (WTACH) has teamed up with the World Asso­ci­ation for Hos­pit­al­ity & Tour­ism Edu­ca­tion & Train­ing (AMFORHT) in an effort to cooper­ate in their respect­ive fields of cul­tur­al her­it­age pro­tec­tion and voca­tion­al train­ing. 

COVID ops

While look­ing at reopen­ing tour­ist spots to domest­ic trav­el­lers, Phil­ip­pines’ Depart­ment of Tour­ism is also con­sid­er­ing “travel bubbles” to allow for­eign tour­ists from coun­tries with low or zero COVID-19 cases to vis­it select destinations. 

Mean­while, The Manila Times is call­ing on the Phil­ip­pines gov­ern­ment to ren­ov­ate and devel­op tour­ism infra­struc­ture while busi­ness is slow. “By doing that now, work could be done with min­im­al dis­rup­tion and less incon­veni­ence to tour­ists and oth­er trav­el­lers. More import­antly, doing so will help eco­nom­ic recov­ery, espe­cially since con­struc­tion pro­jects have a high multiplier.”

To pro­mote domest­ic tour­ism in Geor­gia, prime min­is­ter Giorgi Gakharia vis­ited the 200-year-old Ger­man set­tle­ment of Asureti as well as Dash­bashi Canyon in Algeti Nation­al Park. “Togeth­er, we must redis­cov­er our home­land, Geor­gia. We should see again all the places which might have been for­got­ten, with our chil­dren, in order to be best guides for for­eign vis­it­ors when inter­na­tion­al tour­ism is resumed.”

Chris Griffin, boss of Tour­ism North­ern Tas­mania, Aus­tralia reck­ons “we all need a sil­ver lin­ing dur­ing this time”. Writ­ing about how des­tin­a­tion Tas­mania should pos­i­tion itself, Mr Griffin cited research on what vis­it­ors in the “near future” will want: Go back to nature, do as loc­als do, vis­it uncrowded attrac­tions, favour safe busi­nesses, exper­i­ence unique­ness, and explore slowly.

A “com­pre­hens­ive” list of states in India that have lif­ted bans on tour­ism as at Tues­day, July 7: Himach­al Pra­desh; Uttarakhand; Goa; Rajasthan; Mad­hya Pradesh.

Bali, Indone­sia reopened to loc­al tour­ists this week and is pre­par­ing to wel­come back for­eign vis­it­ors from Septem­ber 11. The island’s gov­ernor Way­an Koster said activ­it­ies will resume gradu­ally; in three steps to com­ply with “new nor­mal” policies.

Author­it­ies in the Flem­ish city of Ghent, Bel­gi­um have pre­pared a EUR 1.5 mil­lion (USD 1.7 mil­lion) “three-part recov­ery plan” for a “healthy and sus­tain­able loc­al tour­ism”. Deputy may­or Bram Van Braeck­evelt: “Ghent is ready to wel­come vis­it­ors. The tour­ism of the future starts today. We expli­citly opt for sus­tain­able tour­ism which is in bal­ance with the city and its inhabitants.” 

The importance of good partnerships

Many com­ment­at­ors would like to see pre­vi­ously over­crowded des­tin­a­tions recov­er from the COVID-19 depres­sion with a focus on qual­ity rather than quant­ity. That would be nice, of course. How­ever, some or many extant tour­ism stake­hold­ers will likely go out of busi­ness should this hap­pen. Don’t let one of those be you. Stay as pos­it­ive as you can be. And seek out good part­ner­ships with those who make you their pri­or­ity. 

“GT” is a good part­ner. Ask about part­ner­ship oppor­tun­it­ies.

Regional co-ops

The Eco­nom­ic Cooper­a­tion Organ­iz­a­tion (ECO) may be con­sid­er­ing a “com­pre­hens­ive region­al strategy for sus­tain­able tour­ism devel­op­ment”. ECO mem­ber­ship cur­rently com­prises ten nations: Afgh­anistan, Azerbaijan, Iran, Kaza­kh­stan, Kyrgyz Repub­lic, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Tur­key, Turk­menistan, and Uzbek­istan.

“Not far from the con­ten­tious Line of Actu­al Con­trol (LAC) between India and China is an enclave of peace where both the neigh­bours have joined hands with Myan­mar for biod­iversity con­ser­va­tion and sus­tain­able devel­op­ment”, includ­ing the devel­op­ment of “sus­tain­able com­munity-based tour­ism”. The Land­scape Ini­ti­at­ive for Far East­ern Him­alay­as (HI-LIFE) is imple­men­ted by the Inter­na­tion­al Centre for Integ­rated Moun­tain Devel­op­ment (ICIMOD), which is based in Kath­mandu, Nepal.

There is a call for people inter­ested in devel­op­ing tour­ism products in remote Arc­tic des­tin­a­tions to take part in an EU-fun­ded pro­ject worth more than EUR 1 mil­lion (USD 1.13 mil­lion). The twist is that the products must have sci­ence as their focus. Led by the Arc­tic Centre at the Uni­ver­sity of Lap­land, Fin­land the Sci­entif­ic Tour­ism (SCITOUR) pro­ject will “help small busi­nesses and start-ups based in remote north­ern regions to cre­ate, pro­mote and sell new products”.

Decarbonising transport

France has launched a EUR 15 bil­lion (USD 17 bil­lion) plan for its aerospace industry. The funds are ostens­ibly to accel­er­ate research on a “green jet­liner”; a car­bon-neut­ral suc­cessor to the A320. That would be nice. How­ever, nearly half of the money has already been giv­en to Air France as pan­dem­ic aid. French tax­pay­ers best keep a keen eye on both the pack­aging and the con­tents of this one.

Some 1,000 hydro­gen-powered trucks will ply the roads of Bel­gi­um, west­ern Ger­many, and the Neth­er­lands by 2025. That’s the goal of a coali­tion that includes the Port of Rot­ter­dam Author­ity, truck man­u­fac­tur­ers, an indus­tri­al gas sup­pli­er, and a logist­ics firm.

Indi­an Rail­ways is reportedly on track to be India’s first trans­port organ­isa­tion to be both energy self-suf­fi­cient and net zero-car­bon. The Min­istry of Rail­ways will install sol­ar power plants on Indi­an Rail­ways’ vacant lands.

A shift from cars to sus­tain­able pub­lic trans­port will help Scot­land’s cap­it­al Edin­burgh achieve its car­bon neut­ral goals by 2030. A new report recog­nises the need to first make pub­lic trans­port more access­ible and inter­con­nec­ted.

The online book­store turned inter­net giant, Amazon.com Inc., has signed a 12-month deal to secure blen­ded jet fuel for its air cargo oper­a­tions. Amazon expects the blend — 70% con­ven­tion­al and 30% made from used fats, oils, and greases — will reduce green­house gas emis­sions by 20% com­pared to an equi­val­ent amount of con­ven­tion­al jet fuel.

Keep up with “GT”

If you like “GT” and you don’t want to miss a thing, sub­scribe to “GT’s” free e‑news:

Cultural heritage tourism

Italy’s Refugee Coun­cil has launched La bellezza dell’in­teg­razione — The beauty of integ­ra­tion — which organ­ises cul­tur­al tour­ism train­ing courses for refugees. The pro­ject is fun­ded by the EU’s Asylum, Migra­tion and Integ­ra­tion Fund (AMIF) 2014 – 2020.

The People’s Com­mit­tee in the city of Da Nang, Viet­nam announced a pro­ject to pre­serve Nam O fish sauce mak­ing skills “for tour­ism devel­op­ment” as it cel­eb­rated the saucy new nation­al intan­gible cul­tur­al her­it­age list­ing. 

Rwanda has launched a mobile applic­a­tion to sup­port the Lib­er­a­tion His­tory Tour­ism Trail. The Trail itself was con­ceived in 2018 “in response to the grow­ing demand for her­it­age and cul­tur­al offer­ings and renewed glob­al interest in Rwanda, its lib­er­a­tion story and post-gen­o­cide transformation”.

Eco- & nature-based tourism

In an op-ed for The Express Tribune, Malik Amin Aslam Khan, adviser to Pakistan prime min­is­ter Imran Khan and Glob­al Vice Pres­id­ent of Inter­na­tion­al Uni­on for Con­ser­va­tion of Nature (IUCN), extolled the vir­tues of his country’s “Pro­tec­ted Areas Ini­ti­at­ive”. He wrote that pro­tec­ted areas pay us back in terms of “cre­at­ing spaces for human recre­ation, pro­mot­ing eco­tour­ism, gen­er­at­ing green jobs, enhan­cing resi­li­ence to nat­ur­al dis­asters, con­trib­ut­ing to food and water secur­ity through eco­sys­tem res­tor­a­tion and address­ing issues such as cli­mate change by seques­ter­ing carbon”.

Encour­aged by loc­al main­stream media, Cam­bod­ia’s pub­lic and private sec­tors are enga­ging in the “eco­tour­ism” poten­tial of the country.

Com­munity-led efforts are the primary hope for an endangered fir tree spe­cies and its hab­it­at in Jalisco, Mex­ico. Log­ging and sub­sequent avo­cado plant­a­tions are their primary threat. Advoc­ates are push­ing eco­tour­ism as a way to build prosper­ity while main­tain­ing the forest.

Dak Nong Geo­park in Dak Nong province, Viet­nam, has been nom­in­ated for list­ing in the Glob­al Geo­parks Net­work by UNESCO.

With its trails and water­ways, League City in Texas, USA is pos­i­tion­ing itself to pro­mote bird­ing and boat­ing. Stephanie Molina-Polk of the loc­al CVB reck­ons people will seek out nature-based activ­it­ies to reduce their risk of con­tract­ing SARS-CoV­‑2.

Bud­ding nat­ur­al­ists who love Catalina Island can enjoy a free online train­ing cour­tesy of the Catalina Island Con­servancy. Catalina Island lies off the coast of Cali­for­nia, USA. “With nat­ur­al­ist train­ing going online, we [can] con­nect with people who love Catalina wherever they are,” said out­reach & inter­pret­a­tion spe­cial­ist Hil­lary Holt. Regis­tra­tion for the free course opens on Monday, July 13, on CatalinaConservancy.org.

Support “GT”

If you find “GT” inspir­ing, inter­est­ing, some­what amus­ing, or at least dif­fer­ent then surely it’s worth a little some­thing to you.

It means a huge some­thing to “GT”. Thank you very much to those who have donated. 😍

Friends indeed

As inter­na­tion­al travel bans lengthen, belts tight­en fur­ther in places pre­vi­ously reli­ant on for­eign tour­ism … Here are fun­draisers worth con­sid­er­ing because “GT” Friends & Part­ners are involved. (This con­tent has appeared in “Good news in tour­ism” before, so enjoy it again or scroll down to the next sub­head­ing to skip.)

Khiri Reach, the char­it­able arm of “GT” Part­ner Khiri Travel, has set up a fund to sup­port freel­ance tour guides. Khiri Reach boss Nia Klatte said: “We want to sup­port a group of people who are among the very hard­est hit by the cur­rent crisis: our freel­ance guides. Unfor­tu­nately, in South­east Asia, the gov­ern­ment safety nets are extremely min­im­al if they exist at all for freel­an­cers. And while some domest­ic tour­ism is com­ing back, it will take months or years for tour­ism activ­it­ies to return to ‘nor­mal’.”

Tan­ner C Knorr of “GT” Insight Part­ner Second Look World­wide is endors­ing a fun­draiser organ­ised by “GT” Friend James Nadi­ope, who said: “Since Uganda went into quar­ant­ine with total lock­down fol­lowed by curfew, many fam­il­ies where we work go empty stom­ach with no food to eat. I would like to appeal to all well-wish­ers for fin­an­cial dona­tions to help these vul­ner­able fam­il­ies.” [Call­back: In Janu­ary, Mr Nadi­ope wrote about “How bees, trees, & tour­ism reduce human-wild­life con­flict in Uganda”.]

Many Asi­an ele­phants and their mahouts in Thai­l­and and else­where are in deep trouble. That’s why Hol­lis Burb­ank-Ham­marlund, founder & dir­ect­or of “GT” Insight Part­ner Work for Wild Life Inter­na­tion­al, would ask that you con­trib­ute to the Ele­phant Health­care Emer­gency Life­line Fund, which helps keep veter­in­ari­ans on the job deliv­er­ing essen­tial emer­gency veter­in­ary care to ele­phants that need it most … when they need it most.

Forest patrols by Wild­life Alli­ance rangers in Botum Sakor Nation­al Park in south­w­est Cam­bod­ia may have to be sus­pen­ded. The rangers’ equip­ment, food and wages are provided in entirety by the Golden Tri­angle Asi­an Ele­phant Found­a­tion (GTAEF) and Car­damom Ten­ted Camp both of which depend on tour­ism. And there is no tour­ism. An emer­gency fun­drais­ing page is live. [“GT” Friends Willem Niemeijer and John Roberts are asso­ci­ated with the fun­draiser via Car­damom and GTAEF respectively.]

Not a fun­draiser as such, but a great idea for accom­mod­a­tion pro­viders: “GT” Friend Rachel Sher­wood is organ­ising well-deserved hol­i­days for health­care work­ers at the front lines of the COVID-19 fight. Oper­a­tion Recu­per­a­tion is col­lect­ing pledges from accom­mod­a­tion pro­viders and second home own­ers from all over the world.

Odds & ends

Good news bits ‘n pieces that don’t eas­ily fit into this week’s arbit­rary clusters:

Free “vir­tu­al train­ing” of “micro-cre­den­tial courses” will be rolled out to thou­sands of tour­ism & hos­pit­al­ity work­ers in Pacific island nations, includ­ing Fiji, Kiribati, Nauru, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu, and Vanuatu, should a pilot for 40 prove suc­cess­ful. The courses are made pos­sible by UNDP with funds from the gov­ern­ment of Japan. Oth­er part­ners include the United Nations Devel­op­ment Fund, the Pacific Tour­ism Organ­isa­tion, the Aus­tralia Pacific Train­ing Coali­tion, and the Fiji Hotels & Tour­ism Association.

A “plastic off­set­ting scheme” is hir­ing fur­loughed tour­ism & hos­pit­al­ity work­ers on Bintan, Indone­sia to clean that island’s beaches. In plastic off­set­ting, com­pan­ies spon­sor recov­ery schemes, such as beach clean-ups, to off­set the plastic they use.

The small town of Dun­gog in New South Wales, Aus­tralia is exper­i­en­cing a tour­ism boom thanks to a moun­tain bike trail. The new track was open for only two weeks before the coronavir­us shut it down. Since reopen­ing in June, it has “attrac­ted hordes of riders, lead­ing to a sur­prise eco­nom­ic reviv­al for loc­al business”.

Stay healthy, smile, have a good week … And when you can travel again, remember:

It’s not ‘no’. It’s ‘know’.

Gotta go? Then go!
If you’ve time, go slow
If you don’t, try low
Do what you know is good
And know there is more to know

Fea­tured image (top of post): Extrac­ted back­ground image from an information/update sheet about the Voy­ager space­craft, Human­ity’s Farthest Jour­ney. By NASA; edited by Jay­bear — Voy­ager: Humanity’s Farthest Jour­ney, Pub­lic Domain (CC0) via Wiki­me­dia.

Donations, diversity, disclaimers

To help your cor­res­pond­ent keep his energy-effi­cient lights on, please con­sider a private one-off gift or ongo­ing dona­tion. THANK YOU to those who have! <3

Thank you very much to those who have donated. 😍

You are a tour­ism stake­hold­er — yes, YOU! — so what’s your view? Do you dis­agree with any­thing you have read on “GT”? Join the con­ver­sa­tion. Com­ment below or share your “Good Tour­ism” Insights. Diversity of thought is wel­come on The “Good Tour­ism” Blog. And you will be sup­port­ing an inde­pend­ent pub­lish­er with your ori­gin­al content.

Dis­claim­er 1: It is “GT’s” policy to fully dis­close partner/sponsor con­tent. If an item is not dis­closed as part­ner or spon­sor-related then it will have caught “GT’s” atten­tion by some oth­er more organ­ic means. Part­ner with “GT”. You know you want to.

Dis­claim­er 2: None of the stor­ies linked from this week’s post have been fact-checked by “GT”. All ter­min­o­logy used here is as the linked sources used it accord­ing to the know­ledge and assump­tions they have about it. Please com­ment below if you know there has been buzzword-wash­ing or blatant non­sense relayed here, but be nice about it as the linked sources might get offen­ded. (“GT” won’t.) And as for “GT” bring­ing it to your atten­tion so that you might be the one to set the record straight, you are welcome! 🙂