Green Economy in a Blue World-Full Report

mangroves (Hall, 2011). Though it its difficult to estimate the loss of species associated with land conversion and related aspects, such as pollution, it is generally understood that tourism related land use change has led to a decline in biodiversity (Hall, 2010). Notably, the impact of coastal tourism extends beyond the narrow coastal zone, including road and rail networks, airports, housing development for employees, large shopping centres, and increasingly golf courses and other tourism amenities. Pollution Marine pollution can be caused by hotels, bars and restaurants and other leisure facilities releasing untreated sewage into the sea, or from the discharges from tourist yachts, excursion boats, car ferries and cruise ships. Tourism related marine pollution also consists of solid waste and often less recognized impacts from light and noise pollution in costal environments. Biodiversity Although tourism can have significant negative impacts on biodiversity, when planned The Global Partnership for Sustainable Tourism (GPST) is an initiative launched in 2011 to inject sustainability principles into the mainstream of tourism policies, development, and operations. It emerged as a successor to the International Task Force on Sustainable Tourism Development (ITF-STD). The Secretariat is hosted by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). The mission of GPST is to encourage networking and cooperation to promote the long-term economic health of the tourism sector. By bringing together all actors in tourismsector, it aims toproduce important and long-lasting results. The main strategies are knowledge sharing and project development. Objectives of the partnership • bring together and involve all tourism’s stakeholders • encourage networking among

and managed well tourism can also make a contribution to the protection of biodiversity. Benefits can include specific land and marine planning regulations thatminimize other threats (over exploitation, pollution, habitat loss) as well as providing an economic justification for protected areas (Hall, 2011). Energy use and emissions The use of fossil energy is one of the major environmental problems associated with tourism and travel. According to UNWTO, UNEP and WMO (2008), emissions from tourism (including transports, accommodation and activities) account for about 5 per cent of global CO 2 emissions and up to 12.5 per cent of global radiative forcing, i.e. the warming caused by CO 2 and other greenhouse gases. Most of this (approximately 75 per cent) is caused by transports, and in particular aviation (Scott, et al., 2010). Growth in emissions from aviation is clearly in conflict with global climate policy. 2.2 Climate change

in a Blue World

The Global Partnership for Sustainable Tourism

members • facilitate access to information on sustainable tourism • strengthen,coordinateandencourage the adoption and implementation of sustainable tourism policies • convey success stories • scale-up, adapt and replicate successful projects and initiatives • establish and implement innovative, multi-stakeholder projects The GPST has more than 80 members, including National governments; UN agencies and the Organization for Economic Cooperation andDevelopment (OECD); international organizations and business associations; companies and; non-governmental organizations.

Source: GPST, 2011

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