Rising ecological awareness amongst tourists driving demand for sustainable tourism: Ken Research

Gurgaon: Ken Research has announced its latest publication, “Sustainability in the Travel and Tourism Industry: Emerging Trends, Organizations Approach and Travelers Viewpoint”, which aims at providing in-depth market analysis of sustainability in the travel and tourism industry globally. Further, it provides information about Key drivers of sustainable practices in organizations and Prominence of sustainable measures and green initiatives for future business activities. It elucidates projected change in sustainability management budget over the next two years, the potential impact of sustainable practices on organization's profitability and significant challenges in the industry. It discusses the impact of sustainability in traveler’s selection of hotels, transport, and meals, traveler’s viewpoint about additional expenditure incurred and World's top sustainable hotel destinations.

Global Economic Environment

In past few years, the global economy has witnessed a substantial rise in income and growth. Global integration has contributed significantly in escalating international trade and tourism. Developing countries are best performers currently in terms of economic growth with mind-boggling rise in GDP and income of the middle class population. India, China, and East-Asian tigers are emerging as global superpowers. Developed countries are though growing at a slower pace but income and standard of living are still increasing. But however, the global economy is facing serious economic challenges like rising poverty, unemployment, inequality in income, rising crime, disputes between nations, falling oil prices, etc. which is adversely affecting economies. The European Union, Latin America, and Africa are facing serious economic recessions. But, total global income and trade are increasing.

Brief Overview of global sustainable travel and tourism industry

Global travel and tourism industry globally have witnessed massive expansion in last two decades. Demand for all sort of tourism like adventure tourism, medical tourism, ecotourism, geo tourism, sustainable tourism, etc. is rising.

In past few years, sustainable tourism has evolved globally. In such sustainable travel and tourism practices, tourists take responsibility of exploring the travel location without making any adverse effect on environment, ecology, and society. Various steps are adopted to promote this ecotourism practices:

• Use of carbon neutral way of travel.
• Avoiding hunting of endangered species.
• Many companies are offering sustainable tourism packages.
• Environmental organizations awareness and educational programs.
• Steps were taken by NGO’S and environmentalists.
• Laws formulated by the government for environment protection.

Many factors have led to this rise in demand. All these key drivers of demand in sustainable tourism industry are given below:

Rising Gross domestic product

The rise in GDP and income across nations has led to rising in sustainable tourism. Since sustainable tourism is slightly expensive than normal tourism, now people are ready to pay more for such type of tourism practices.

Rise in ecological awareness

People across the world are becoming more aware of importance of ecology and environment conservation, they are rising demand for sustainable tourism in order to preserve the environment in its pure form.

Steps were taken by stakeholders

The government, non-government organizations (NGO’s), environmentalists, local communities, etc. have taken stern efforts to promote sustainable tourism. This has generated awareness amongst tourist to adopt sustainable tourism practices.

Organisational responsibility

Many firms are coming up with sustainable tourism packages which are extremely cost effective and efficient in promoting green tourism.

Many key market trends explained in report are listed as below:

• Improvement in efficiency and cost reductions are encouraging organizations to implement sustainable practices
• The majority of organizations have implemented energy-efficient lighting and the regular monitoring of electricity/gas/water consumption
• The highest percentage of executives forecast an increase in their organization's profitability with the implementation of sustainable practices.
• The survey results reveal that 47% of executives either strongly agree or agree to pay 10% more to stay at a green lodging facility.

Major Market Players

Accor Hotels, London Heathrow Marriot, The Kempinski Hotel are leading market players which are providing sustainable tourism packages to the tourists to promote green and responsible tourism.

Conclusion

Though sustainable tourism industry is expanding substantially but there are many challenges to this industry:

• High costs involved in implementing sustainability measures.
• Tourists are less interested in paying higher travel expenses.
• Even though awareness is increasing but still tourists are not that aware of environmental protection.

But despite challenges industry is expanding rapidly. The majority of travel and tourism companies have already initiated sustainable practices. The focus on reducing costs and improving efficiency, and minimizing the carbon footprint, are encouraging organizations to implement sustainable practices. Travel and tourism companies state that sustainable measures and green initiatives are important for their business prospects, and aim to utilize sustainability to enhance brand awareness and increase their competitive advantage. Despite the high costs involved in implementing sustainability measures, sustainable practices reduce operational costs, decrease waste, and enhance worker productivity, which ultimately boosts the overall profit margin of travel and tourism companies. Travel and tourism companies strongly agree that consumers would pay 10% more to stay at a green lodging facility.

Key topics covered in the report

• Current global economic scenario
• Key drivers of sustainable practices in organizations.
• Significant challenges towards implementing sustainability measures.
• Major market players of the insurance sector of Armenia.
• Key consumer trends which will influence insurance market
• Consumer demographics, trends, and behaviors