#  ENVR E-118C. Sustainable Tourism 

 





- Professor: Wendy Purcell
- Term: Fall
- Day: W
- Time: 1:30-3:30PM, or on demand
- School: Harvard Extension School
- Course ID: 16642

 Travel and tourism (T&T) accounts for over ten percent of global gross domestic product (GDP). However, its negative impacts on people and the planet require sustainability initiatives, which can be positioned as a strategic driver in a sector that has enormous potential to drive fulfilment of the United Nations sustainable development goals (SDGs). The unique interdependency of T&T with many other sectors such as energy, transportation, buildings, and food systems create challenges and opportunities for advancing sustainability systemically. This course presents innovative case studies within the sector while challenging students to recognize the technical, economic, and political barriers to scaling sustainability solutions. The dual health and economic crises of the COVID-19 pandemic threw the disruptive forces acting on T&T into sharp relief, drawing attention to the interconnected and hyper-dependent nature of sustainability, health, and business. Lockdowns and social distancing strategies effectively closed and could ultimately decimate the sector. With the pandemic affording people and planet some short-term relief from T&T's impact on communities, destinations, and the environment, this is the time to re-imagine the sector and pursue sustainable T&T. This could help attenuate its negative impacts and advance the contribution T&T makes to global citizenship and to a more balanced economy and equitable society. As a sector, T&T needs to widen its view of sustainability beyond immediate operational impacts to consider the broader systems in which they operate, adopting sustainability leadership practices for the twenty-first century and beyond. To accelerate sustainability in the sector, greater attention needs to be paid to the trade-offs and dilemmas presented by its activities. Indeed, T&T has enormous potential to educate the traveler and drive fulfilment of the SDGs. In 2019, the T&T sector contributed 10.3 percent to global GDP, over US $8.9 trillion, supporting one in ten jobs (330 million) worldwide and one in five new jobs over the last five years, with 3.5 percent growth in 2019 compared to the global economy at 2.5 percent. The sector has seen six decades of consistent growth, with tourism outpacing the UN growth projections over the period 2010-2019 and 45 percent of international travel arrivals to emerging economies in 2017. Late 2019 forecasts predicted that these trends would continue, with tourism arrivals forecast to grow 3-4 percent globally in 2020, despite a number of expected economic, political, and health disruptions. For many countries, T&T is the dominant sector generating income, tax revenues, and economic security for millions of individuals and their families. However, the World Travel and Tourism Council, the UN's World Tourism Organization, and leaders in this industry clearly recognize that under the business-as-usual growth scenario, this sector is unsustainable. Supported by conscious consumerism and greater governmental oversight, T&T's negative impacts can be addressed and its positive contribution to global citizenship and a more equitable society advanced.



 

 



 

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