International Year of Sustainable Tourism for Development
The international community declared 2017 as “International Year of Sustainable Tourism for Development”. In this context, it may already become visible how seriously the inter- national community and the nation states are taking the 2030 Agenda. Do they start to initiate rigorous measures for tourism to become more sustainable, or will their business as usual approach block the way to achieving the SDGs?
Promoters of tourism, led by the UNWTO, keep praising tourism as „the“ promising engine of development which can significantly contribute to achieving the SDGs. Using impressive economic tourism statistics they strongly recommend supporting tourism through Official Development Assistance and Aid for Trade. The equation that growing tourism, designed to be as sustainable as possible, will automatically lead to sustainable development and must therefore be supported with public funding is also one of the underlying premises for the International Year of Sustainable Tourism for Development 2017 which the UNWTO will implement as a lead agency.
This assumption is not matched by reality for many reasons, including the failure to factor in the contradictions between growth and sustainable development. Air travel, fuelled by the rapid growth in tourism, significantly contributes to global warming. The boom in tourism destinations leads to congestion and overcrowding, to scarcity of living space and resources, while costs of living are increasing. Additionally, tourism focussed on interna- tional guests is highly vulnerable to external shocks, including international terrorism or natural disasters.
The growth paradigm is based on the assumption that local people benefit from the tour ism boom via ‘spill over’ and ‘trickle down’ effects. However, it does not include how marginalised groups may effectively make use of their rights to participation. Nowadays, it is widely acknowledged even by institutions like the International Monetary Fund that the trickle-down theory does not materialise in the ‘real world’ and so continued ‘belief’ in it has led to adverse effects on progress towards more sustainable development especially of poor and marginalized groups, because it is contributing to increasing inequalities.