Sustainable tourism’s endless balancing act: Preserving, promoting Ras Al Khaimah

The new year is an oppor­tun­ity to reflect on the val­ues that mat­ter to the travel & tour­ism industry even after the pan­dem­ic ends, accord­ing to Raki Phil­lips of the Ras Al Khaimah Tour­ism Devel­op­ment Author­ity. In this “Good Tour­ism” Insight, Mr Phil­lips explains how the Emir­ate is embed­ding sus­tain­ab­il­ity into everything it does.

Let me start by telling you a little bit about Ras Al Khaimah. It is the north­ern-most emir­ate in the United Arab Emir­ates, loc­ated only 45 minutes’ drive from Dubai Inter­na­tion­al Air­port. Ras Al Khaimah boasts spec­tac­u­lar moun­tain views, epic his­tor­ic sites, ter­ra­cotta dunes, and a breath-tak­ing coast­line, mak­ing it the per­fect des­tin­a­tion for act­ive adven­tur­ers, cul­tur­al explorers, and leis­ure seekers look­ing for the ideal des­tin­a­tion to explore with their fam­il­ies and friends. We are also home to the UAE’s highest peak, Jebel Jais, where tem­per­at­ures are around 10 degrees lower than at sea level.

Jebel Jais also stands as a sym­bol of how Ras Al Khaimah’s tour­ism industry is adapt­ing to change while pro­tect­ing the endur­ing value of our nat­ur­al sur­round­ings. As many oth­er art­icles on this blog have noted, it is an end­less bal­an­cing act to pro­mote a des­tin­a­tion while also safe­guard­ing what makes it spe­cial in the first place. This bal­ance is made more dif­fi­cult by the dis­rup­tion arising from COVID-19, but even before the pan­dem­ic we in the industry were cop­ing with the dis­rup­tions brought on by tech­no­logy and shift­ing con­sumer patterns.

How have we done this? Here are four focus areas:

1. Sustainable tourism development

At Jebel Jais, for example, we are devel­op­ing the Emir­ate’s moun­tain eco-sys­tem and doing it in a sus­tain­able way that does not dis­rupt the nat­ur­al surroundings. 

A little back­ground: The Jais Adven­ture Park already fea­tures the Jebel Jais Flight — the world’s longest zip­line — the Jais Sky Tour with its sev­en zip­lines, and the Jais Sky Maze, a sus­pen­ded obstacle course with two levels of rope swings, sus­pen­ded bikes, and wobbly rope bridges. There is also a wel­come centre that includes the UAE’s highest res­taur­ant, 1484 by Puro (the name alludes to its alti­tude in metres), where the kit­chen uses loc­ally-sourced ingredi­ents to cre­ate an array of excit­ing dishes. 

Our long-term invest­ment plan for Jebel Jais, executed in con­junc­tion with oth­er lead­ing gov­ern­ment entit­ies, includes an eco-friendly pop-up hotel, food & bever­age vil­lage, and Moun­tain Lodge, all of which will not be det­ri­ment­al to the nat­ur­al surroundings.

2. Tourism product diversity & visitor dispersal

We pur­sue growth at a sus­tain­able and diverse level. By spread­ing our offer­ings across the adven­ture, cul­ture, retail, hos­pit­al­ity, well­ness, and out­door sec­tors, we pre­vent any one aspect of the Emir­ate from becom­ing sat­ur­ated. In this way we are always look­ing for new fea­tures and new guests. For example, as we emerge from the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic we are hop­ing to appeal to the work-from-home crowd that came to the fore in 2020. We believe our hos­pit­al­ity and life­style pack­ages will allow them to explore Ras Al Khaimah while stay­ing on top of their day jobs. (Indeed, many of our own people are now work­ing remotely, with exten­ded sup­port on the men­tal health front to ensure team mem­bers are at their strongest).

3. Tourism benchmarking & certification

To ensure that sus­tain­ab­il­ity is reflec­ted in our res­ults as well as our inten­tions, we work with Aus­tralia-based EarthCheck, the world’s lead­ing sci­entif­ic bench­mark­ing, cer­ti­fic­a­tion, and advis­ory group for travel & tour­ism. We have benefited from their expert insight to cre­ate and imple­ment sus­tain­able prac­tices across our hos­pit­al­ity port­fo­lio, includ­ing increased recyc­ling, decreased waste and energy con­sump­tion, green pro­cure­ment, and clean-ups at our tour­ist hot­spots. In order to ensure that the dis­cip­line of con­ser­va­tion is taught to the next gen­er­a­tions, we are run­ning a schol­ar­ship at the Amer­ic­an Uni­ver­sity of Ras Al Khaimah that focuses on tour­ism-related edu­ca­tion­al programming.

We have recently announced the “Green Hotels Rat­ing” 2021 ini­ti­at­ive, which is tak­ing place for the fourth con­sec­ut­ive year in part­ner­ship with Ras Al Khaimah Pub­lic Ser­vices Depart­ment. This pion­eer­ing ini­ti­at­ive aims to achieve 100% integ­rated sus­tain­ab­il­ity in all of Ras Al Khaimah’s hotels. This ini­ti­at­ive is one of many under the wider nation­al recyc­ling pro­gramme “My Emir­ate, my home”, which aims to embed good waste man­age­ment prac­tices through­out the Emir­ate, from indi­vidu­als to organisations. 

4. UNESCO World Heritage ambitions

The hos­pit­al­ity sec­tor makes an import­ant con­tri­bu­tion to the growth of Ras Al Khaimah tour­ism, of course, includ­ing her­it­age tour­ism and envir­on­ment­al tour­ism. Both of these niches are wit­ness­ing a not­able increase in demand. UNESCO World Her­it­age announced late last year that four sites in Ras Al Khaimah — Jul­far, Jazirah al-Hamra, Shi­m­al, and Dhayah — have been included on the tent­at­ive list of World Her­it­age Sites, an acknow­ledge­ment that will serve to fur­ther strengthen the recov­ery per­form­ance of the Emirate’s tour­ism and hos­pit­al­ity industries.

Look­ing ahead, it is clear that des­tin­a­tions will have to embody a sense of self that drives their pur­pose and val­ues. We firmly believe in the travel & tour­ism industry’s abil­ity to suc­cess­fully emerge from its cur­rent dif­fi­culties. It is our aim to raise our stand­ing as a glob­al des­tin­a­tion and grow Ras Al Khaimah’s tour­ism offer­ing while stay­ing true to the val­ues that earned us the title of 2021 Gulf Tour­ism Cap­it­al for a second year.

I’ll fin­ish with a his­tory les­son from my alma mater, the Uni­ver­sity of Cent­ral Flor­ida (UCF). When UCF opened its doors in 1968, its pur­pose was to train engin­eers and oth­er spe­cial­ists for the space race. (Cape Canaver­al is just down the road.) But over time the region­al pop­u­la­tion needed a wider offer­ing, so the uni­ver­sity expan­ded its syl­labus and is now home to one of the world’s top train­ing academies for our sec­tor, the Rosen Col­lege of Hos­pit­al­ity Man­age­ment. The point is, UCF adap­ted to chan­ging times but pre­served its fun­da­ment­al value: edu­ca­tion. You could say the same about Ras Al Khaimah’s tour­ist sec­tor. We are adapt­ing to chan­ging times while pre­serving our fun­da­ment­al value: good tourism.

What do you think? Share a short anec­dote or com­ment below. Or write a deep­er “GT” Insight. The “Good Tour­ism” Blog wel­comes diversity of opin­ion and per­spect­ive about travel & tour­ism because travel & tour­ism is everyone’s business.

Fea­tured image (top of post): Abseil­ing in Ras Al Khaimah, an Emir­ate of the United Arab Emir­ates. Source: Ras Al Khaimah Tour­ism Devel­op­ment Authority

About the author 

An Amer­ic­an nation­al and a flu­ent Arab­ic speak­er, Raki Phil­lips has a great under­stand­ing of the Middle East hav­ing worked there since 2005. 

As CEO of Ras Al Khaimah Tour­ism Devel­op­ment Author­ity (RAKTDA), Raki is respons­ible for the con­tin­ued growth of the Emir­ate as a world-class des­tin­a­tion for leis­ure and busi­ness travel. This includes col­lab­or­at­ing with key part­ners on brand­ing, stand­ards, infra­struc­ture devel­op­ment, and invest­ment oppor­tun­it­ies. The RAKTDA boss is also tasked with ensur­ing tour­is­m’s con­tri­bu­tion to the eco­nom­ic and social prosper­ity of Ras Al Khaimah and the qual­ity of life for all its residents.

With more than 20 years of exper­i­ence with some of the world’s most renowned hos­pit­al­ity brands, Raki has been recog­nised by Hoteli­er Middle East as one of the “Top 20 Most Power­ful Arab Hoteliers”. 

Raki’s pre­vi­ous role with Inter­na­tion­al Hos­pit­al­ity Con­sult­ing Group, saw him devel­op hotel pro­ject pipelines exceed­ing US$ 5 bil­lion in assets, and nego­ti­ate multi-mil­lion-dol­lar hotel deals for lux­ury brands in more than 25 markets.

Raki Phil­lips holds a Bach­el­or of Sci­ence in Busi­ness Admin­is­tra­tion from the Uni­ver­sity of Cent­ral Flor­ida, and a MBA in Organ­iz­a­tion­al Man­age­ment from the Uni­ver­sity of Phoenix, Arizona.