There are at least some who are taking the ?green? word seriously. Christopher Bailey, Chief Creative Officer of Burberry is one of them. At the recent International Herald Tribune Techno Luxury conference in Berlin, he shared the feat technology had helped him achieve: Using social media platforms like Facebook and Skype to set up video conferences he reduced his company?s air travel by 17%. If you think that?s no big deal, consider this: United Nations Environment Programme, the World Meteorological Organisation and UNWTO suggest that emissions from tourism, including transports, accommodation and activities (excluding the energy used for constructions and facilities for example) account for about 5% of global CO2 emissions. Transport accounts for 75% of this share.
?15% countries account for 60% of the arrival and departure figures in the world,? adds M P Bezbaruah, Permanent Representative, UNWTO. It is a cautious path to tread as ?climate is the principal resource of tourism. Just 1.5 to 2.5 degree increase in the global temperatures can lead to Germany losing 60% of its winter sports. The impact on the Great barrier Reef and Maldives will be even more catastrophic.? His solution? ?Sustainable tourism, but a model that is also economically viable.? Clearly, a measure that we may have to adopt on a urgent basis for, projections indicate that the share of aviation-related emissions will grow from 40% in 2005 to 52% by 2035. In terms of the number of trips made, global tourism will grow by 179%, passenger kilometres travelled will rise by 222%, while CO2 emissions will increase at 152%.
?Just rectifying the processes can make a huge difference,? says Arjun Sharma, CMD, Le Passage Tours to India. ?You?d be surprised to know that a flight from Delhi to Mumbai doesn?t fly on a striaght line. It comes from via Pratapgarh? making the route virtually a triangle. We need seamless tourism. Even travelling from Delhi to Jaipur by road, one needs to stop thrice to paytoll. Just calculate the amount of time and energy lost in the process,? Sharma further adds.
Apart from trying to skip long distance travel as and when possible, a responsible traveller can do a lot more. ?We are trying to promote experential tourism. Asking for smoked salmon flown in from 6,000 miles away, Evian fromFrance…just adds to the carbon footprint of a traveller,? says Sharma.
A lot of players in the hospitality industry are trying to emphasise on the local element. Six Senses Resorts and Spas for instance, levies a 2% carbon tax on the guests to neutralise the carbon emissions created through the travel and stay to the destination. ?We try to be as organic in our approach as possible,? says Fred Selvi, Executive Assistant Manager, Evason Ma?in, Six Senses? property in Jordan. Even the little details are taken care of ? the waste bins are made of jute, the bath showers are eco-friendly and the resort even purifies water for drinking purposes instead of using bottled water.
Even the Island of Majorca, Spain introduced a tourism ?eco-tax? in 2002, charged on per-night basis and weighted according to the standard of accommodation. Each tourist visiting the Marine Park, Great Barrier Reef pays a ?environmnetal management fee. Quite a few lessons here to be learnt . ?Implementing the laws strictly is even more important, says Subhash Goyal, Chairman, STIC Travels, citing the ?ban on plastic by the Delhi government? a law flouted openly.?
The bottomline is, a responsible approach by the industry as well as the tourists can go a long way in arresting climate change.