World Green Tourism conference in Abu Dhabi

First ever event of the nature and scale, Abu Dhabi witnessed the gathering of global experts at the World Green Tourism conference on 22-24th November 2010. United Arab Emirates isn’t the place that many would relate to any thing ‘green’ or ‘sustainable’ considering the opulence and wealth that the region has witnessed.

“Considering the fact that the Emirates subsidises 50-80%of its consumers electricity bills as of now, the reasoning for a green tourism business isn’t much a financial incentive for the hospitality industry. “ says young Jad Frangieh who is the green champion at One to One boutique hotel in Abu Dhabi. On a site visit to the property, he was particularly keen on explaining that “we are not a Green hotel. However, we have decided to join the Green Hotels initiative of Abu Dhabi Tourism Authority and implement sustainable practices in our properties. It’s high time we that we all wake up and realise that maintaining a green patch of grass in a desert isn’t green and that is in fact the anti-thesis of anything green. We are glad that this conference brought in many innovators and entrepreneurs and practitioners of sustainable tourism”.

Abu Dhabi's electricity rates of 15 fils per kilowatt-hour (kwh) for expatriates and 5 fils for Emiratis are among the lowest in the world. Subash V Puthenveetil, Hygiene and Safety Mangaer from Anantara said,“We are all aware of the fact, there is so much to do in this region when it comes to sustainability. Our management is keen on being the leaders in this segment and we are ready to go with Abu Dhabi tourism in this direction”.

The conference saw experience sharing from regions as varied as Sweden, Thailand, India, Ireland, UK and UAE. Some of the speakers included, Prof. Harold Goodwin from ICRT, Mary Mulvey from Green Box in Ireland, Mansoor Mohamed from City of Cape Town, Arnfinn Oines from Six Senses Resorts and Spas in Thailand. Key note speakers included Bruce Poon Tip of Gap Adventures, Newyork Times Journalist and Author Elizabeth Becker and George Hickton, former CEO of Tourism New Zealand.

Mubarak Hamad Al Muhairi, Director General of ADTA is keen to take the sustainability initiative to a new level. ‘We have launched the pioneering Green Hotels programme, and also have initiated the Environment, Health and Safety Management System covering the entire tourism sector. We have made only small steps, but we are certainly keen on learning from other destinations to become a globally recognized, sustainable tourism destination.’

Organisers have already announced the dates for next GreenTourism conference on 5-7 December 20100 at ADNEC in Abu Dhabi. Prof. Harold Goodwin, Director of International Centre for Responsible Tourism and one of the speakers at the conference said, “For once we are seeing a serious government backed intervention to make the industry more sustainable.”

The Blue Yonder presented two case studies on its experience of working in India in a round table on Green Tourism for Hotels and tour operators as as well as in a session "conversations with industry experts:operating with a commitment to sustainability in the tourism industry.

For more details check World Green Tourism conference site

WTM musings

Four days at the World Travel Market in London can be exhaustive. Meetings, networking, product launches, dinners, drinks and further socialising. It's a world on it's own. It's a place where in the last five years we have come across some fantastic people, who inspired our initiatives, gave us more strength to pursue our dreams, when we thought we had no more energy to fight it out in the tough world of business.

2010 WTM in London was special in many ways. The Responsible tourism networking on the 8th at the 7 Dials club was a super hit. Even when it was organised on the first day, there were many people who rebooked their flights so as to come and attend the event. During the ICRT alumni networking on wednesday I came across a person who said, "Oh my! it was so wonderful, all 23 of us were camping in a room just to watch the pitches of new initiatives". The live feed had some technical glitches. However, I guess the event will be known for the enthusiasm amongst participants wanting to be connected to a network they believe would change the way we understand travel and sustainable development.

The event also resulted in forming new partnerships and alliances. University in Liverpool to ITB in Berlin, to small NGOs and community based tourism initiatives were seen building networks and exploring ways to work together. One of our partners beamed, "Looks like more business actually happens over networking with you guys than sitting in a stand and waiting for buyers to come by". I can imagine that to be quite true. Responsible Tourism Networking simply rocks. Thanks to Sally from Tripbod for the never ending enthusiasm to co-organise such fringe events.

Responsible tourism awards has become a main stay of world responsible tourism day celebrations at the WTM and looks like it's getting tougher and tougher to win an award there. This makes me happy to see two of our friends Ishita Khana and Sam Raphael from Ecosphere and Jungle Bay Resorts in Dominica honoured by Virgin Responsible tourism awards.

WTM sponsored responsible tourism networking also brought together many like minded people and it was wonderful to meet many old friends still working with such amazing passion, that you feel that you have not even touched the tip of ice berg that is sustainable tourism. Catching up with Louis D'Amore (IIPT), Fiona Jeffrey (Just A Drop), Dr. Lars R. Lindkvis (Base Camp Foundation), Justin Francis (responsibletravel.com), Dr. Lotfi Kaabi (Planet Art Exchange) and Luke Ford (Gunyah) was very inspiring. Watch out for these people in the next few months for some really inspiring news.

To see Social Tours, Help Tourism, Ecosphere and The Blue Yonder doing business on the platform of The Green Circuit for me is one of the real highlight of this World Travel Market. Looks like industry is heeding to such initiatives positively. The fact that The Green Circuit stand were always busy with one meeting or the other compared to numerous stands in Incredible India pavillion that was empty might be a message for the future way of doing trade shows. Towards the last day, while rest of the exhibitors were running for their flights or a last minute city trips, the GC partners were seen evaluating the trade show on the spot and planning for the next one. How to forget the wonderful evening spent with the whole team?!

Instead of sharing another positive news in this post as an icing on the cake, I am leaving World Travel Market with a bad taste due to some comments we had to hear from buyers and trade partners and many strangers about the attitude of Incredible India. While exhibitors like Indonesia were going out of their way to promote their local coffee ( probably one of the best coffee I had in many months!) and inviting anyone and everyone to join them, Incredible India caterers were rude, cold and even arrogant enough to refuse drinks or snacks if they were not exhibitors of India pavilion. Apparently they had "instructions" from above that the food / drink services should be provided only to the Indian exhibitors.

The staff at the counter were bluntly refusing tea and coffee to people who come by to take a sip. It was funny to see some of our friends were refused drinks because they didn't look like Indians! (Isn't that sort of racist behaviour as well?). If the catering service was only for Indian exhibitors, why on the earth did they maintain an open cafeteria and ended up gaining bad reputation for a brand that seems to be proud about Athiti Devo Bhava ( Guest is our God!).

Other than the poorly constructed stands at Incredible India pavilon, the ignorance of whoever decided to take such a stand was the most embarrassing momen. Some of us were profusely apologising to those people who brought this to our notice! Not sure if that had any impact to change the negative perception of the tourism department.