“Good Tourism” news & events

Enjoy “GT’s” monthly “Good news in tour­ism” posts, which sum­mar­ise a month’s worth of “GT” Insights, “GT” Travel, “GT” Part­ner news, and your comments.

Also find here Partner/Sponsor mes­sages from The “Good Tour­ism” Blo­g’s Part­ners and friends plus cov­er­age of travel & tour­ism industry events to which “GT” is invited or oth­er­wise involved. Ad hoc sponsored news posts are also very welcome.

“GT” retired its weekly “Good news in tour­ism” posts in April 2021. The weekly posts fea­tured brief sum­mar­ies of and links to pos­it­ive industry news from off-piste sources. Before Decem­ber 2019, “GT” would sum­mar­ise under-repor­ted news stor­ies or thought-pro­vok­ing fea­ture art­icles by non-industry media. The sources were well-attrib­uted and linked. Any con­tent “GT” repub­lished in full was avail­able for that pur­pose from the likes of The Con­ver­sa­tion and Thom­son Reu­ters Found­a­tion.

Are “all-inclusive” tourism packages to blame for locals missing out?

June 1, 2017

Geo Routes Cultural Institute President Giannis Balakakis criticises all-inclusive packages. Source BBSF

Geo Routes Cul­tur­al Insti­tute (GRCI) Pres­id­ent Gian­nis Bal­aka­kis cri­ti­cised what he called “tra­di­tion­al” mass tour­ism mod­els, which for dec­ades were the main­stay of the industry in Greece and oth­er Balkans and Black Sea coun­tries. In many cases these mod­els led to the “all-inclus­ive” phe­nomen­on, which meant loc­al com­munit­ies reaped little or no tour­ism rev­en­ue yet […]

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Posted in "GT" news & events, "GT" news from Europe
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Pacific unsurprisingly strong on sustainability rhetoric

June 1, 2017

Sustainable Tourism Development spto

Giv­en that island nations have most to lose from sea level rises, it is no sur­prise that Fran­cois Mar­tel, sec­ret­ary-gen­er­­al of Pacific Islands Devel­op­ment For­um (PIDF) believes that any invest­ment in adapt­a­tion to, and mit­ig­a­tion of, cli­mate change makes sense. PIDF reck­ons the Pacific needs devel­op­ment pro­cesses that are: Respons­ive Par­ti­cip­at­ory Inclus­ive Account­able Out­­­come-driv­en Able to balance […]

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Posted in "GT" news & events, "GT" news from Oceania
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Thompson Okanagan, Canada, seeks “Biosphere” status

May 27, 2017

Thompson Okanagan region, Canada, seeks "Biosphere" status. Source: TOTA

The Thompson Okanagan region in Brit­ish Columbia, Canada is seek­ing the “Bio­sphere Des­tin­a­tion Cer­ti­fic­ate”, which could make it only the 20th des­tin­a­tion in the world to achieve this. Thompson Okanagan Tour­ism Asso­ci­ation (TOTA) Pres­id­ent & CEO Glenn Mandzi­uk has signed a “Let­ter of Com­mit­ment” (LoC) with the Respons­ible Tour­ism Insti­tute (RTI). Sign­ing the LoC with […]

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Posted in "GT" news & events, "GT" news from the Americas
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Could a primate be driven to extinction by “ecotourism”?

May 26, 2017

Could the endangered red-shanked douc langur ('Pygathrix nemaeus') be pushed to extinction by ecotourism? Source: GreenViet

Sci­ent­ists have warned that an endangered prim­ate may be pushed into extinc­tion by the devel­op­ment of con­crete build­ings for, iron­ic­ally, a “lux­ury eco-tour resort com­plex”. Some 237 herds of red-shanked douc langurs (Pygath­rix nemaeus), com­pris­ing more than 1,300 indi­vidu­als, are liv­ing in the Sơn Trà Nature Reserve in Đà Nẵng, Viet­nam, reports VNS. The Da […]

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Posted in "GT" news & events, "GT" news from Asia
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Apo Island, Philippines to levy new fees on tourists

May 25, 2017

Sea turtle 'pawikan' off the shores of Apo Island. Source: Wikimedia / Jun V Lao

The famed dive des­tin­a­tion of Apo Island in Dauin, Negros Ori­ent­al, Phil­ip­pines, will levy new fees for tour­ists, accord­ing to the Phil­ip­pine News Agency. The fees, agreed upon by the Pro­tec­ted Area Man­age­ment Board (PAMB), would include moor­ing fees for boats used by tour­ists; for diving, swim­ming, snorkel­ing and oth­er activ­it­ies. Jose Bry­an Arranguez, Community […]

Read More Apo Island, Philippines to levy new fees on tourists
Posted in "GT" news & events, "GT" news from Asia
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Kerala tourism director Kiran a champion of accessibility

May 24, 2017

When it comes to accessibility, Kerala Tourism refuses to be a backwater. Source: Kerala Tourism

A Dir­ect­or at the Depart­ment of Tour­ism in the Indi­an state of Ker­ala is lead­ing by example by mak­ing all state-admin­istered tour­ism facil­it­ies access­ible to all. The Times of India reports that in line with its policy of “bar­ri­er-free tour­ism”, the Ker­ala tour­ism depart­ment will make all its facil­it­ies, includ­ing parks and hotels, “dis­­­abled-friendly” before taking […]

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Posted in "GT" news & events, "GT" news from Asia
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