With tourists reaching 96% of their pre-COVID-19 status, which forms one part of the benchmark for approaching the pre-pandemic mark, the tourism industry is recovering quite strongly. In the wake of this rebound, one fundamental shift is taking place: planning for the future sustainability and social responsibility issues confronting the industry. In order to raise awareness on responsible travel, UN Tourism, the agency of the United Nations, collaborated with easyJet holidays, one of the leading European and North African holiday companies, in launching a new ESG framework for tourism enterprises.
It’s necessary to create a harmonized ESG framework:
As the tourism industry gets back on track, operating businesses are getting more and more stressful to respond productively to their environmental as well as social concerns. However, most existing frameworks often lack sufficient ESG metrics to measure the core components such as environmental sustainability, community involvement, and employee well-being. Furthermore, the absence of standard methodology also prevents companies in the tourism sector from comparative analysis and performance evaluation regarding sustainability and social responsibility.
In response to this challenge, UN Tourism and the SDG Impact Lab at Oxford University have collaborated to develop the first ever unified ESG framework for tourism companies. It is envisioned that this new framework will help fill the gap currently existing by affording a well-defined set of metrics and standards that will help firms in the tourism sector understand, manage, and report on their environmental and social impacts.
Why an ESG Framework is Crucial for Tourism
Tourism is one of the largest industries in the world economy and the most important driver of a country’s economic growth, but with a humongous environmental footprint. More travel directly translates into more emissions, resource use, and pressure on local communities. Meanwhile, tourism businesses have more stringent standards of social responsibility-from their employees’ well-being to contributing to the local community.
It would help the companies in the tourism sector to assess and improve their sustainability practices and consequently add more assurance to the fact that they are constructive contributors not only to the environment but also to society. Thus, with a standardized approach, the company will be able to keep its operations aligned towards global sustainability goals and get the ability to benchmark performance with competitors at the same time.
Generally, it addresses the following three key areas:
Environmental Impact: Companies will now be able to measure their carbon footprint, energy use, and waste generation.
Social Impact: The companies will be encouraged to meaningfully engage with local communities and ensure the well-being of their employees.
Governance: The new initiative has established clearer reporting standards that companies are obliged to make on their operations; therefore, they increase transparency as well as accountability.
easyJet holidays in the ESG Initiative
easyJet holidays is a prominent player in the travel space and it has collaborated with UN Tourism to assist in the development of this new ESG framework. Improvement in the sustainability of tourism-from both company easyJet and the industry as a whole-will be the aim, understanding that a standardized framework will better streamline both its own and the whole industry’s ways of working.
To support the creation of this ESG framework, easyJet holidays has reached out. The effort itself takes the lead in voicing responsible tourism, reflecting an industry-wide trend whereby travel and tourism companies are turning toward sustainability as a means of balancing profitability and ethical responsibility.
Public-Private Sector Collaboration
The fact that UN Tourism and easyJet holidays are also collaborating with the SDG Impact Lab underlines the essential role of public-private collaborations in addressing global challenges. Tourism is certainly a very complex industry, and standardizing the approach to sustainability will require the input of the many different actors involved in the field, including governments, businesses, and universities.
Together with collaboration, the organizations should take a lead in an effort that is not only a framework but also an implementable business framework that is consonant with the overall broader sustainability goals set out by the United Nations. For example, they are to advocate for the Sustainable Development Goals that all the United Nations member states approve.
The new ESG framework will enable governments and businesses to embrace a single set of data and principles that will make their efforts in sustainability more aligned. It will also enable tourism companies to report on ESG performance transparently and in standardized terms. Investors, customers, and other stakeholders will be able to objectively assess and compare the differences in levels of sustainability among various businesses.
Looking Ahead: What This Means for the Industry
A unified ESG framework could therefore be a turning point in how businesses go about sustainability as the tourism industry continues to recover. The above framework would present companies with a roadmap that would contribute to the improvement of their environmental and social impacts while enhancing transparency and accountability.
New ESG standards will offer the businesses a lot in managing their risks, reputation, and customer loyalty. Whenever consumers are going to be conscious of the environmental and social implications of their travel choices, companies with demonstrated intent towards sustainability are going to have an upper hand.
Meanwhile, a governance system will also be better aware of impacts within their borders – environmental and societal impacts – to better formulate policies that help to realize responsible tourist growth.
This is a step closer to sustainable tourism in industries that are socially responsible, exemplified by the partnership between UN Tourism, easyJet holidays, and the SDG Impact Lab. Its ability to provide clear guidelines for managing ESG performance would improve the industry in its fight against environmental and social issues.
Conclusion
This is the most critical moment for the tourism industry as it recomposes after the pandemic; adding this new ESG framework may steer its course of the future. One of the key players in the industry, easyJet holidays, has supported the framework, and with the support of UN Tourism, businesses shall be empowered to measure themselves and improve their sustainability activities. Such a framework would be needed in shifting the industry toward responsible and ethical tourism.
Source: UN Tourism