A sustainable tourism plan can only happen with collaboration across borders and within communities. This is one of the key conclusions from the panel on “The Collaborative & Sustainable Future Of Asia-Pacific Adventure Tourism” that took place at the Adventure Travel World Summit in Hokkaido, Japan, on 12 September 2023.
With panelists from three diverse destinations and backgrounds: Katsumi Endo, Executive Vice President of Japan National Tourism Organization (JNTO); Brent Hill, CEO of Tourism Fiji; and Matteo Galeazzi from Easia Active, a tour operator specializing in Southeast Asian adventures, one message was clear — it’s all about vuvale, the Fijian word for family.
And the “family” of destinations in East Asia and the Pacific Islands is already taking steps towards sustainable development practices based on collaboration. Endo shared that the JNTO overseas offices are used not only for marketing and promotion, but also as a means to get insights into that destination's sustainable tourism strategies. Hill stressed the difficulty of creating sustainable policies if Fiji were working alone — that recycling plants need greater scale, and this scale comes from banding together with neighboring islands to work together on issues of waste management.
© ATTA / Hassen Salum - ATWS2023
A key player in these strategies is the private sector. In Southeast Asia, where sustainable tourism is still in its infancy in terms of cohesive, cross-border policies, it is the private sector who have been leading the charge. Easia Active's philosophy regards sustainability as “an utmost necessity” and has therefore established green teams in each destination to maintain consistent sustainable values for its customers as they cross from one country to another. In fact, this company has been Travelife certified in multiple countries across the region, which is a great step towards establishing permanent sustainable practices.
When discussing the importance of the private sector in tourism, Galeazzi emphasized that the “private sector should be the main force and push the public sector to change and go in the right direction.”
An opposing, more provocative view was taken by Hill, who called for the public sector to be “more bullish” when it comes to implementing sustainable tourism policies, and that both incentives for the private sector should be used in addition to harsher penalties. He explained Tourism Fiji's drive to lead the push towards sustainability, and to lead with their own initiatives. One example was replacing the Tourism Fiji car feet with Electric Vehicles (EVs) even after it was said that it couldn't be done. Undeterred, the tourism authority brought in experts to set up charging stations and took an active role to put all the infrastructure in place needed to make operating EVs feasible.
“Now, there are more than 10 organizations operating EVs,” Hill said proudly. “A small seed opens up the government's eyes”.
The panel wrapped up with a discussion on the upsides the panelists have experienced since implementing sustainable policies. Galeazzi summed up a few of the highlights for Easia Active, “It's very satisfying to see concrete results of our actions in our destinations and communities. Our employees and suppliers are much happier to work with us, and more motivated.”