what is tourism in urban

UN Tourism | Bringing the world closer

• All Regions

Urban Tourism – We Need to Build Cities for Residents and Visitors, Finds UNWTO Conference

Share this content.

• Share this article on facebook
• Share this article on twitter
• Share this article on linkedin

PR No. : PR18073

Madrid, Spain, 8 October 2018 – At the 7th UNWTO Global Summit on Urban Tourism in Seoul, Republic of Korea (16-19 September) , the Secretary-General of the World Tourism Organization (UNWTO), Zurab Pololikashvili, laid out a vision looking to 2030 for urban tourism that contributes to sustainable and inclusive cities.

Key amongst the conference conclusions was that technology and innovation will play a key role in this vision, but only if cities invest in the right infrastructure and skills, set an enabling regulatory framework and break the silos that exist among data sources. Speakers also stressed the role that tourists themselves play in respecting the local communities, traditions and values of cities.

The conference was opened by Park Wonsoon, Mayor of Seoul, who stressed that “Seoul has improved its tourism because we have been able to predict changes in tourism, technology, society and environment to follow trends and react appropriately to challenges”.

Do Jonghwan, Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism of the Republic of Korea, commended the summit for producing “an array of suggestions on cities’ function and role in tourism, the value and significance of cities to be shared with travellers, and how tourism can bring financial benefits with added values for residents.”

Memorable experiences were discussed at length as a major shift in motivation for tourists. “Tourism is a top sector in the experience economy, which is now becoming the transformational economy – cities, to be competitive, need to be authentic and provide transformational experiences,” said the conference’s keynote speaker B. Joseph Pine II, author of the best-seller ‘The Experience Economy’.

The conference stressed that tourism can and should contribute to the New Urban Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), particularly Goal 11 on safe, resilient, inclusive and sustainable cities.

For that, participants called for tourism to be included in urban governance; led by cooperation among public, private sector and civil society; planned and managed considering local community needs and benefits; and smart in using technology and innovation to promote authentic experiences, monitor tourism impact and promote dispersal policies to spread benefits to the whole city and manage congestion. These four key areas of action will be taken forward to the 8th UNWTO Urban Tourism Summit, to be held in Astana, Kazakhstan in 2019.

On the occasion UNWTO released the report ‘‘Overtourism’? Understanding and managing urban tourism growth beyond perceptions’, produced in collaboration with the Centre of Expertise Leisure, Tourism & Hospitality (CELTH), Breda University of Applied Sciences, and the European Tourism Futures Institute (ETFI) of NHL Stenden University of Applied Sciences. The report proposes eleven strategies and 68 measures to help understand and manage visitor growth in cities.

The 7th UNWTO Global Summit on Urban Tourism was organized by UNWTO and the Seoul Metropolitan Government with the support of the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism of the Republic of Korea, the Korea Tourism Organization and the Seoul Tourism Organization.

Useful links:

Conference website

Technical conclusions of the conference

News release on the launch of ‘Overtourism’? Understanding and managing urban tourism growth beyond perceptions’

Travel.Enjoy.Respect website

UNWTO Communications Department

Tel: (+34) 91 567 8100 / Fax: +34 91 567 8218 /  [email protected]

Follow us on  Facebook ,  Twitter ,  Instagram ,  YouTube ,  LinkedIn  and  Flickr .

Related Content

Kingdom of morocco wins high-level vote to host next wo..., tourism has ‘life-changing potential’ - world tourism o..., the world tourism organization and globalia launch the ..., world tourism organization general assembly opens with ....

• Skip to main content
• Skip to primary sidebar

IResearchNet

Academic Writing Services

Urban tourism.

Urban tourism refers to the consumption of city spectacles (such as architecture, monuments, and parks) and cultural amenities (such as museums, restaurants, and performances) by visitors. Studying urban tourism requires taking seriously leisure activities and transient populations, features of the city that much of past urban theory declines to address. However, a number of developments in recent decades have led tourism to assume a larger place in urban scholarship. As industrial manufacturing deserts dense urban areas, entertainment plays an expanded role in many city economies. Leisure and consumption for some means work and profits for others. The attraction and accommodation of visitors has become a central concern for public and private city elites. The sizable but fleeting population of visitors to the city has a surprising influence over local politics, investment choices, and the built environment.

The label ‘‘tourist’’ frequently evokes pejorative connotations, which color not only popular but also scholarly representations. While crude stereotypes of the tourist suggest a plodding brute oblivious to all but the most obvious and pre packaged attractions of the urban landscape, the leisure activity of tourism in fact contains a wide range of consumption activities and orientations toward the city. Moreover, the ‘‘business or pleasure’’ distinction obscures the fact that many trips are multipurpose, with business travelers also shopping, visiting museums, and dining out. Susan Fainstein and Dennis Judd advocate the use of the term visitor rather than tourist, and see tourism as a particular mode of activity in which visitors engage. Especially today, even permanent residents may at times use aspects of their own cities ‘‘as if tourists,’’ consuming its spectacular, exotic, and heterogeneous amenities (Lloyd & Clark 2001).

Cities have long been privileged destinations for visitors as well as sites of residence. The ancient city was a destination for pilgrims, merchants, political envoys, and adventurers, some of whom produced accounts of the exotic spectacles they encountered. The industrial revolution led to rapid growth in the permanent populations of large European and US cities during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. During the industrial epoch large cities remained spaces of spectacle and a multitude of entertainments. In the prototypical industrial city of Chicago, for example, city elites were not satisfied merely being hog butcher to the world, actively seeking to enhance the city’s cultural image and attract visitors by launching the Columbian exposition of 1892 (in which the Ferris Wheel was introduced).

Still, the sociological study of the city, grounded in the massive growth of urban areas coinciding with the industrial revolution, has traditionally treated tourism peripherally if at all. The last half century, however, has brought significant change. Industry has increasingly declined in the older cities of the US and other developed nations, enhanced technologies of transportation and communication have made travel far more convenient and widely available, and the aesthetic and experiential dimensions of consumption have come to play an arguably much greater role in the global economy. Fast growing cities like Las Vegas and Orlando feature economies primarily organized around tourism and consumption. For old and new cities, the active production of spectacle and consumption opportunities is now a crucial feature of the political economy. In this case, tour ism can no longer be a tertiary concern for urban theory.

In the 1980s, newly popular theories of post modernism took the lead in examining the city as a site of spectacle and consumption. Focusing on the signifying qualities of the material landscape, thinkers such Umberto Eco, Jean Baudrillard, and Mark Gottdeiner direct considerable attention to tourist destinations like the Las Vegas strip and Disneyland. The postmodern tendency to emphasize the transient and the ephemeral in social life likewise results in considerable attention to the spaces and activities of tourists. In this light it is unsurprising that Frederic Jameson identifies Los Angeles’s Bonaventure Hotel as the signature space of ‘‘postmodernism in the city.’’ While these approaches have been influential, the mostly semiotic method employed in them is dissatisfying for many sociologists.

Disneyland and Las Vegas remain potent models that inform the study of the post industrial city as an object of consumption. Many theorists advance the notion that the city itself is increasingly constructed as a theme park in order to entice consumers. These approaches, which can be called the ‘‘Disneyfication’’ or ‘‘theme park’’ models of urban tourism (Sorkin 1992; Hannigan 1998; Bryman 2004), emphasize homogenizing tendencies in large cities, as tourist spaces come to look much the same from one city to the next. They focus on the injection of large scale developments such as sports stadiums, convention halls, and shopping malls into formerly decaying areas. Baltimore’s Inner Harbor and Chicago’s Navy Pier are signature spaces of this style of redevelopment in the US. These spaces of consumption tend to be highly segregated from the rest of the city and the everyday activity of residents. Hence, Judd (1999) identifies the construction of ‘‘tourist bubbles,’’ districts that organize tourist activity in a highly regimented fashion while actively excluding undesirable elements.

The success of Disneyfied tourist entertainment is more uneven than these approaches usually anticipate, and themed entertainment venues like Planet Hollywood and the Rainforest Cafe routinely failed during the 1990s. Critics like Michael Sorkin (1992) decry the ‘‘inauthenticity’’ of themed spaces; what is increasingly clear is that tourists themselves often wish to consume what they perceive to be authentic attractions within a city. Rather than the homogenization of the urban landscape that Disneyfication anticipates, these attractions derive from specific aspects of local identity. Many cities combine large scale theme developments with more ‘‘indigenous’’ cultural attractions. Grazian (2003) shows that tourists search for authenticity in entertainments such as the Blues in Memphis and Chicago, or country music in Nashville. Local venues strategize to satisfy these expectations, producing what MacCannell (1999) identifies as ‘‘staged authenticity.’’ Often, tourists practice multiple styles of consumption, in Chicago visiting obligatory attractions like Navy Pier, the Sears Tower Observation Deck, and the splendid shopping of the Miracle Mile, while also attempting to locate the ‘‘real’’ Chicago in smoky Blues clubs ‘‘off the beaten path.’’

Indeed, the attraction of cities for tourists derives from both the breadth and the depth of urban culture. Breadth signals the diversity of attractions that center city districts are uniquely poised to offer, which can include professional sports, museums of various sorts, high, low, and middlebrow theater, musical performances, and an exceptionally wide range of dining and shopping opportunities. Depth refers to the cumulative nature of a city’s identity (Suttles 1984), the resonance that attaches to particular aspects of the built environment and local culture. These include landmarks like the Eiffel Tower, the Golden Gate Bridge, or the Empire State Building. Tourists may experience Yankee Stadium as pleasantly haunted by the ghosts of Ruth and Mantle and the streets of Greenwich Village by past generations of storied bohemians. Thus, while some popular tourist destinations such as Orlando and Las Vegas are constituted almost entirely by prefabricated entertainments, and revel in the absence of depth, many others are valued for a place identity that emerges from distinct and varied histories.

At a more mundane but equally important level, cities contain essential infrastructure, achieved through a balance of public and private investment, which enables them to accommodate large numbers of visitors. Such infrastructure includes airports, convention centers, and significant amounts of lodging. Conventions are major vehicles for attracting visitors, and in these cases corporate expense accounts underwrite consumption in restaurants and other entertainment venues. Just as Chicago competed to win the Columbian Exposition near the end of the nineteenth century, entering the twenty first century urban boosters are locked in competition for major conventions as well as other high profile, visitor attracting events such as the Olympics or the Super Bowl.

Local boosters argue that new tourist attractions generate multiplier effects that will improve the tax base and benefit permanent residents. Actual results have been uneven. While the entertainment economy of large cities implies a substantial workforce, the service jobs created are often far less promising than the manufacturing jobs that they replace, representing a mostly disorganized sector of cleaning personnel, kitchen staff, ticket takers, and the like. Casino gaming, a strategy for attracting tourist dollars recently turned to by the most economically desperate urban districts, including downtown Detroit and Gary, appears to produce particularly dubious effects for the local quality of life of poor residents.

The costs and benefits of tourist enterprises promise to be important objects of both theoretical and policy analyses in coming years. In the wake of the 2001 attack on the World Trade Center, security has emerged as another key factor in the regulation of city visitors that will bear considerable scrutiny. Long ignored, the relationship between cities and their visitors has become a core concern in contemporary urban theory.

References:

• Baudrillard, J. (1989) America. Verso, New York.
• Bryman, A. (2004) The Disneyization of Society. Sage, Thousand Oaks, CA.
• Eco, U. (1986) Travels in Hyperreality. Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, New York.
• Gottdeiner, M. (1995) Postmodern Semiotics: Material Culture and the Forms of Postmodern Life. Blackwell, Oxford.
• Grazian, D. (2003) Blue Chicago: The Search for Authenticity in Urban Blues Clubs. University of Chicago Press, Chicago.
• Hannigan, J. (1998) Fantasy City: Pleasure and Profit in the Postmodern Metropolis. Routledge, New York.
• Hoffman, L. M., Fainstein, S. S., & Judd, D. R. (Eds.) (2003) Cities and Visitors: Regulating People, Markets and City Space. Blackwell, Oxford.
• Jameson, F. (1991) Postmodernism: or, the Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism. Duke University Press, Durham, NC.
• Judd, D. R. (1999) Constructing the Tourist Bubble. In: Judd, D. R. & Fainstein, S. (Eds.), The Tourist City. Yale University Press, New Haven.
• Lloyd, R. & Clark, T. N. (2001) The City as an Entertainment Machine. Research in Urban Sociol ogy: Critical Perspectives on Urban Redevelopment 6: 357-78.
• MacCannell, D. (1999) The Tourist: A New Theory of the Leisure Class. University of California Press, Berkeley.
• Sorkin, M. (Ed.) (1992) Variations on a Theme Park. Hill & Wang, New York.
• Suttles, G. (1984) The Cumulative Texture of Local Urban Culture. American Journal of Sociology 90: 283-304.
• Urry, J. (1990) The Tourist Gaze. Sage, London.

Back to Top

Back to Urban Sociology .

Programs submenu

Regions submenu, topics submenu, africa's oil economies amidst the energy transition: nigeria, china's rise, russia's invasion, and america's struggle to defend the west: a conversation with david sanger, the axis of upheaval: capital cable #95, africa's oil economies amidst the energy transition: angola.

• Abshire-Inamori Leadership Academy
• Aerospace Security Project
• Africa Program
• Americas Program
• Arleigh A. Burke Chair in Strategy
• Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative
• Asia Program
• Australia Chair
• Brzezinski Chair in Global Security and Geostrategy
• Brzezinski Institute on Geostrategy
• Chair in U.S.-India Policy Studies
• China Power Project
• Chinese Business and Economics
• Defending Democratic Institutions
• Defense-Industrial Initiatives Group
• Defense 360
• Defense Budget Analysis
• Diversity and Leadership in International Affairs Project
• Economics Program
• Emeritus Chair in Strategy
• Energy Security and Climate Change Program
• Europe, Russia, and Eurasia Program
• Freeman Chair in China Studies
• Futures Lab
• Geoeconomic Council of Advisers
• Global Food and Water Security Program
• Global Health Policy Center
• Hess Center for New Frontiers
• Human Rights Initiative
• Humanitarian Agenda
• Intelligence, National Security, and Technology Program
• International Security Program
• Japan Chair
• Kissinger Chair
• Korea Chair
• Langone Chair in American Leadership
• Middle East Program
• Missile Defense Project
• Project on Critical Minerals Security
• Project on Fragility and Mobility
• Project on Nuclear Issues
• Project on Prosperity and Development
• Project on Trade and Technology
• Renewing American Innovation Project
• Scholl Chair in International Business
• Smart Women, Smart Power
• Southeast Asia Program
• Stephenson Ocean Security Project
• Strategic Technologies Program
• Transnational Threats Project
• Wadhwani Center for AI and Advanced Technologies
• All Regions
• Australia, New Zealand & Pacific
• Middle East
• Russia and Eurasia
• American Innovation
• Civic Education
• Climate Change
• Cybersecurity
• Defense Budget and Acquisition
• Defense and Security
• Energy and Sustainability
• Food Security
• Gender and International Security
• Geopolitics
• Global Health
• Human Rights
• Humanitarian Assistance
• Intelligence
• International Development
• Maritime Issues and Oceans
• Missile Defense
• Nuclear Issues
• Transnational Threats
• Water Security

Spotlighting Sustainability: Urban Tourism in Sub-Saharan Africa

Photo: iLab/CSIS

Commentary by Judd Devermont and Marielle Harris

Published November 17, 2021

In the 10th edition of Talking Urban Futures in Africa, Judd Devermont and Marielle Harris sit down with Regis Musavengane, Pius Siakwah, and Llewellyn Leonard to discuss why urban tourism is unique from general tourism in sub-Saharan Africa and why African governments should develop policies that reflect this distinct subset. Judd, Marielle, Regis, Pius, and Llewellyn discuss examples of urban tourism in the region; how sustainable urban tourism takes into account the impact on economy, environment, and community; and how governments can foster genuine inclusion—not just tokenistic participatory approaches. Finally, they explore how U.S. policymakers can engage urban tourism issues in sub-Saharan Africa, including through skills sharing, governance support, and real commitment on climate change goals. Regis, Pius, and Llewellyn are authors of the recent book, Sustainable Urban Tourism in Sub-Saharan Africa (Routledge, 2021).

• Regis Musavengane is a political ecologist, tourism and conservation geographer, and a faculty member at the Midlands State University, Zimbabwe, Department of Tourism, Hospitality and Leisure Sciences. He is a research associate at the Department of Environmental Science, School of Ecological and Human Sustainability, University of South Africa (UNISA).
• Pius Siakwah is a development and resource geographer, with interest in natural resource governance, energy, and tourism, and a research fellow at the Institute of African Studies (IAS), University of Ghana.
• Llewellyn Leonard is an environmental sociologist and professor at the Department of Environmental Science, School of Ecological and Human Sustainability, UNISA.

The discussion, moderated by Judd Devermont and Marielle Harris, has been edited for purposes of brevity and clarity.

JD: Regis, can you give us a working definition of urban tourism? How would you distinguish urban tourism from other types of tourism in sub-Saharan Africa?

RM: Urban tourism is a type of tourism that takes place in urban settings. It is distinct from rural tourism, which takes place on the outskirts of cities or in unpopulated areas. Traditional tourism includes extraordinary events not necessarily part of people’s daily lives (e.g., visits to beaches or mountains), whereas urban tourism may include daily lived experiences such as conferences and concerts.

Urban tourism often takes place in cities’ central business districts. In Johannesburg, South Africa, tourist activities are centered in Gold Reef City or Sandton. All across the region, conferences, weddings, and even sporting events are organized in three- to five-star hotels. It's very rare to find these hotels in rural areas, so everyone will drive or fly into the city to partake in these types of activities.

Township tourism is another form of urban tourism. It is particularly popular in South Africa and Kenya. Tourists will visit the densely populated communities such as Soweto in Johannesburg, Khayelitsha in Cape Town, or Kibera in Nairobi. Tourists will utilize local food outlets and tourist facilities located in the townships or slums. African townships and slums contain rich historical information that may be of interest to both domestic and international tourists.

In other countries in the region, some tourists visit the densely populated markets and slums to see the living conditions of the ordinary populace, not the plush areas of the city that are similar to other parts of the developed world. Although this tourism may sometimes be exploitative—and tourists may look down on these populations—it draws more attention to the lived conditions of the poor and may ultimately translate into policies to tackle poverty.

Urban residents with formal businesses benefit from urban tourism. Those residents in the informal sector can also benefit through selling souvenirs or other small items to tourists who travel to urban areas.

MH: What is the difference between sustainable and unsustainable urban tourism?

PS: Sustainable urban tourism considers the economy, the environment, and the community. It is inclusive, leveraging sociocultural systems to promote visits from tourists. An example of sustainable tourism is the Chale Wote Street Art Festival in Accra, Ghana, where local and international artists and citizens help to paint murals on Accra’s streets. Unsustainable urban tourism, on the other hand, compromises the social and cultural values of communities, as well as the environment, for material gains and gentrification.

RM: In addition, Cape Town, South Africa, developed responsible tourism guidelines in 2002. Most establishments in the city, such as hotels and event tourist adventures, are “green certified” or “responsible tourism certified.” This means they are buying green equipment and taking into account the realities of poor people living in the vicinity. When touring the Western Cape’s wine route area, for example, tourists are encouraged to donate to the poor and toward wildlife. Cape Town is actually a blueprint for responsible tourism practices here in Africa. Sustainable urban tourism has the potential to mitigate urban poverty and urbanization-related risks.

MH: That is super interesting. Can you tell us more about how African governments can best navigate urban tourism and address environmental, social, and political risks?

LL: Unplanned urban growth is a major problem within Africa and contributes to much of the urban risk. Poor governance structures and a lack of capacity also contribute to this risk. There is a need for governments to properly understand urban risks in the context of tourism.

There is a lack of policy regarding sustainable tourism. South Africa has been the powerhouse in this area, but it is the exception. Most African countries lack urban sustainability policies and end up prioritizing macroeconomic top-down development initiatives that benefit the elite and exclude marginalized populations from urban spaces. There needs to be a strong approach by governments and the private sector to actually include the vulnerable groups in development design and decisionmaking processes. So it's actually about moving away from poor governance to enabling good governance.

There needs to be genuine inclusion of vulnerable groups to inform decisions. We do not need a tokenistic participatory approach as we've sometimes seen. It's about emphasizing accountability, transparency, fairness, and the rule of law. The final point in governance I think is for government to enable reflexive governance—more reflection on its own practices and processes. And there are structures and power relations that will have an impact in terms of how we move toward sustainable urban tourism and the need to address corruption and nepotism.

JD: How should U.S. policymakers pay attention to urban tourism? How should they prioritize it as something distinct from tourism in general?

RM: When African governments are making decisions and budget allocations, there is no way they can exclude the issue of tourism. Look at the impact of Covid-19 on the tourism sector. So many economies are suffering because of reduced travel due to lockdowns. Politics cannot be ignored in African tourism, and the U.S. government should pay attention to these trends when thinking about its foreign policy and aid relationships.

PS : There must be a difference between U.S. policy toward tourism in general and urban tourism in particular. Urban tourism should address the lived experiences and the daily struggles of the urban poor. Policies should integrate the urban poor into the urban space instead of excluding them through urban redevelopment and gentrification practices. For example, if the United States wants to meet the needs of a specific population—urban citizens—through development interventions, it must take into account the unique opportunities and challenges related to urban tourism. Most of these urban poor live in spaces that lack social services like roads, and an increasing upper and middle class also need some of those services. Policies and interventions should not facilitate the dispossession of the poor’s already fragile homes and economic activities.

For example, the U.S. government provided funding to Ghana through the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC). Part of the funding was used to construct roads in urban spaces with the aim of improving the movement of people. One of the highways—the N1—divided the urban area without the necessary road safety architecture, which would have included a bridge connecting each side. People who must cross this road to meet their daily needs have been killed in road accidents as cars speed in the area. In the future, the United States should insist that local communities are responsible for helping design urban interventions.

LL: I think we need to understand that we're living in a global society and a global economy. The United States, in a way, will need to take responsibility. If I take the issue of climate change and greenhouse gas emissions, the United States is one of the biggest emitters. And vulnerable populations in Africa are some of the hardest hit by climate change, particularly for coastal and urban environments on the continent.

There is a need for the United States to recognize the world as a global nation and that pollution knows no boundaries. U.S. choices impact the entire world. The United States needs to take responsibility to actually assist in making African cities more resilient to climate change, which may include assisting in terms of governance and setting up certain governing structures.

And, as I mentioned before, we lack the capacity, skills, and expertise. If you go to an African government department and say, "Who's your climate change expert who works on tourism?” you wouldn't be able to get a positive response, because the skills are not there. Skills sharing can happen through the African Union, and the United States can also play a role.

Judd Devermont is the former director of the Africa Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington, D.C. Marielle Harris is the research associate with the CSIS Africa Program.

Commentary  is produced by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a private, tax-exempt institution focusing on international public policy issues. Its research is nonpartisan and nonproprietary. CSIS does not take specific policy positions. Accordingly, all views, positions, and conclusions expressed in this publication should be understood to be solely those of the author(s).

© 2021 by the Center for Strategic and International Studies. All rights reserved.

Judd Devermont

Marielle harris, programs & projects.

• Urbanization in Africa

6 years to the Global Goals – here's how tourism can help get us there

Inclusive governance and community engagement in tourism planning and management can aid sustainable development goals. Image:  Unsplash/D Jonez

.chakra .wef-1c7l3mo{-webkit-transition:all 0.15s ease-out;transition:all 0.15s ease-out;cursor:pointer;-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;outline:none;color:inherit;}.chakra .wef-1c7l3mo:hover,.chakra .wef-1c7l3mo[data-hover]{-webkit-text-decoration:underline;text-decoration:underline;}.chakra .wef-1c7l3mo:focus,.chakra .wef-1c7l3mo[data-focus]{box-shadow:0 0 0 3px rgba(168,203,251,0.5);} Zurab Pololikashvili

.chakra .wef-1nk5u5d{margin-top:16px;margin-bottom:16px;line-height:1.388;color:#2846F8;font-size:1.25rem;}@media screen and (min-width:56.5rem){.chakra .wef-1nk5u5d{font-size:1.125rem;}} Get involved .chakra .wef-9dduvl{margin-top:16px;margin-bottom:16px;line-height:1.388;font-size:1.25rem;}@media screen and (min-width:56.5rem){.chakra .wef-9dduvl{font-size:1.125rem;}} with our crowdsourced digital platform to deliver impact at scale

• Tourism is a significant economic force that has returned close to pre-pandemic figures, with 1.3 billion international travellers and tourism exports valued at approximately $1.6 trillion in 2023.
• The tourism sector must adopt sustainable practices in response to climate change, biodiversity loss and pollution.
• Inclusive governance and community engagement in tourism planning and management are key to ensuring the sector’s support to local identity, rights and well-being.

With mounting challenges to our societies – conflict, geopolitical tension, climate change and rising inequality – we should look to the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and their promise of a shared blueprint for peace, prosperity, people and planet by 2030. However, as UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres reminds us , “that promise is in peril” with the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic having stalled three decades of steady progress.

Tourism can help deliver a better future, and with less than six years to go, it must unleash its full power to achieve this.

Have you read?

Turning tourism into development: mitigating risks and leveraging heritage assets, what is travel and tourism’s role in future global prosperity, how travel and tourism can reach net zero, tourism’s economic boon.

International tourists reached 88% of pre-pandemic levels in 2023. Around 1.3 billion tourists travelled internationally, with total tourism exports of $1.6 trillion, almost 95% of the $1.7 trillion recorded pre-pandemic. Preliminary estimates indicate that tourism's direct gross domestic product (GDP) reached $3.3 trillion, the same as 2019, as per our World Tourism Barometer .

Yet, persisting inflation, high interest rates, volatile oil prices and disruptions to trade could impact the pace of recovery. Uncertainty derived from ongoing Russian aggression against Ukraine, the Israel-Hamas conflict and growing tensions in the Middle East, alongside other mounting geopolitical tensions, may also weigh on traveller confidence.

Results from the World Economic Forum’s latest Travel & Tourism Development Index reflect the impact of some of these challenges on the sector’s recovery and travel and tourism’s potential to address many of the world’s growing environmental, social and economic problems.

Therefore, as the sector returns, it remains our responsibility to ensure that this is a sustainable, inclusive and resilient recovery.

The climate imperative

Climate change, pollution and biodiversity loss are making extreme weather events increasingly challenging for destinations and communities worldwide. The tourism sector is simultaneously highly vulnerable to climate change and a contributor to harmful greenhouse gas emissions.

Accelerating climate action in tourism is critical for the sector’s and host communities’ resilience. We are taking responsibility but more needs to be done to reduce plastics, curb food waste, protect and restore biodiversity, and reduce emissions as the demand for travel grows.

The framework proposed by the Glasgow Declaration on Climate Action in Tourism is catalyzing the development and implementation of climate action plans, guided by and aligned to five pathways (measure, decarbonize, regenerate, collaborate and finance). It’s a clear plan to enable the transition towards low carbon and regenerative tourism operations for resilience. Over 850 signatories from 90 countries are involved in innovating solutions, creating resources and connecting across supply chains, destinations and communities.

Leaving no-one behind

Tourism can be a powerful tool to fight inequality, within and between countries but only so long as we also address diversity, equity and inclusion in the sector, provide decent jobs and ensure respect for host communities and shared benefits.

One good example of tourism’s potential to progress shared prosperity is Rwanda’s Tourism Revenue Sharing Programme . Initiated in 2005 and revised in 2022, it aligns conservation efforts with community development. The programme designates a portion of National Parks revenues to ensure that local communities benefit directly from conservation and tourism activities. Initially set at 5%, the share of total revenue now stands at 10% .

Travel & Tourism Development Index 2024

New tools, jobs and values

Technology, ease of travel and the pandemic have all accelerated changes in how we work. Again, as we progress, we have a duty to ensure we are leaving nobody behind. Education and skills are vital to progressing equality, growth and opportunities for all, making them a cornerstone of the SDGs. However, tourism businesses face a labour shortage to cope with travel demand. We must make tourism more attractive to young people so they see it as a valued career path.

We also need to support micro-, small- and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs), which make up around 80% of all tourism businesses worldwide and up to 98% in some Group of 20 (G20) economies. While each country’s challenges are different, digitization, market access, marketing and skill gaps are key areas we should address with targeted policies for MSMEs and entrepreneurship.

Measuring impact

Sustainable tourism is only possible if we can properly measure the sector’s impact and progress in three dimensions: economic, social and environmental.

Last March, the UN adopted a new global standard to measure the sustainability of tourism (MST) – economic, social and environmental. Developed under the leadership of UN Tourism and endorsed by all 193 UN member states, the MST statistical framework provides the common language (agreed definitions, tables and indicators) for producing harmonized data on key economic, social and environmental aspects of tourism.

Countries and other stakeholders now have the foundation to produce trustworthy, comparable data for steering the sector towards its full potential. And indeed, over 30 countries and subnational regions have already implemented the flexible MST framework, focusing on the data most relevant to their sustainability efforts.

Centring community wellbeing

Increasingly, communities worldwide demand a tourism sector that respects their identity, rights and wellbeing.

Transforming the sector requires rethinking governance as more holistic with a whole-government approach, multi-level coordination between national and local policies and strong public-private-community partnerships. Listening and engaging residents in tourism planning and management is at the core of the sector’s future.

Take Barcelona as an example. Here, e tourism represents 14% of the city’s GDP. The Tourism and City Council was created in 2016 and relies on citizen participation to advise the municipal government on tourism public policies. This initiative demonstrates the advancement of tourism governance from classic public-private collaboration to public-private-community. Therefore, issues around the visitor economy become those for official city consideration.

Delivering on tourism’s potential

We urgently need to grow investment in tourism. The data is encouraging: the UN Conference on Trade and Development World Investment Report 2023 shows that global foreign direct investment across all sectors, tourism included, reached approximately $1.37 trillion that year, marking a modest increase of 3% from 2022.

At the same time, we need to ensure this investment is targeted where it will make the most significant and most positive impact by building greater resilience and accelerating the shift towards greater sustainability.

The significant benefits tourism can offer our economies and societies, as well as the challenges obstructing us from fully delivering on this potential, are now more widely recognized than ever.

Tourism is firmly on the agenda of the UN, G20 and Group of Seven nations and the Forum. Delivering on this potential, however, will require political commitment and significant investment. But given what is at stake and the potential benefits to be gained, it should be seen as a huge opportunity rather than a daunting challenge.

Don't miss any update on this topic

Create a free account and access your personalized content collection with our latest publications and analyses.

License and Republishing

World Economic Forum articles may be republished in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International Public License, and in accordance with our Terms of Use.

The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.

The Agenda .chakra .wef-n7bacu{margin-top:16px;margin-bottom:16px;line-height:1.388;font-weight:400;} Weekly

A weekly update of the most important issues driving the global agenda

.chakra .wef-1dtnjt5{display:-webkit-box;display:-webkit-flex;display:-ms-flexbox;display:flex;-webkit-align-items:center;-webkit-box-align:center;-ms-flex-align:center;align-items:center;-webkit-flex-wrap:wrap;-ms-flex-wrap:wrap;flex-wrap:wrap;} More on Sustainable Development .chakra .wef-17xejub{-webkit-flex:1;-ms-flex:1;flex:1;justify-self:stretch;-webkit-align-self:stretch;-ms-flex-item-align:stretch;align-self:stretch;} .chakra .wef-nr1rr4{display:-webkit-inline-box;display:-webkit-inline-flex;display:-ms-inline-flexbox;display:inline-flex;white-space:normal;vertical-align:middle;text-transform:uppercase;font-size:0.75rem;border-radius:0.25rem;font-weight:700;-webkit-align-items:center;-webkit-box-align:center;-ms-flex-align:center;align-items:center;line-height:1.2;-webkit-letter-spacing:1.25px;-moz-letter-spacing:1.25px;-ms-letter-spacing:1.25px;letter-spacing:1.25px;background:none;padding:0px;color:#B3B3B3;-webkit-box-decoration-break:clone;box-decoration-break:clone;-webkit-box-decoration-break:clone;}@media screen and (min-width:37.5rem){.chakra .wef-nr1rr4{font-size:0.875rem;}}@media screen and (min-width:56.5rem){.chakra .wef-nr1rr4{font-size:1rem;}} See all

What is needed for inclusive and sustainable global economic growth? Four leaders share their thoughts 

Liam Coleman

May 24, 2024

Translating Critical Raw Material Trade into Development Benefits

Tourism is bouncing back - but can we make travel sustainable?

Robin Pomeroy and Sophia Akram

May 23, 2024

Protecting the magic of travel - and local economies

Topaz Smith

May 21, 2024

The ‘4 Cs’ of being a Chief Sustainability Officer

Gareth Francis

May 17, 2024

Designing Dixie: Tourism, Memory, and Urban Space in the New South

"Although many white southerners chose to memorialize the Lost Cause in the aftermath of the Civil War, boosters, entrepreneurs, and architects in southern cities believed that economic development, rather than nostalgia, would foster reconciliation between North and South. In Designing Dixie, Reiko Hillyer shows how these boosters crafted distinctive local pasts designed to promote their economic futures and to attract northern tourists and investors.

Neither romanticizing the Old South nor appealing to Lost Cause ideology, promoters of New South industrialization used urban design to construct particular relationships to each city’s southern, slaveholding, and Confederate pasts. Drawing on the approaches of cultural history, landscape studies, and the history of memory, Hillyer shows how the southern tourist destinations of St. Augustine, Richmond, and Atlanta deployed historical imagery to attract northern investment. St. Augustine’s Spanish Renaissance Revival resorts muted the town’s Confederate past and linked northern investment in the city to the tradition of imperial expansion. Richmond boasted its colonial and Revolutionary heritage, depicting its industrial development as an outgrowth of national destiny. Atlanta’s use of northern architectural language displaced the southern identity of the city and substituted a narrative of long-standing allegiance to a modern industrial order. With its emphasis on alternative southern pasts, architectural design, tourism, and political economy, Designing Dixie significantly revises our understandings of both southern historical memory and post–Civil War sectional reconciliation."

Support The Center for Perservation of Civil Rights Sites

Privacy Policy

Report accessibility issues and get help

The Center for Preservation of Civil Rights Sites University of Pennsylvania Stuart Weitzman School of Design

Columbus unveils new tourism campaign amidst major urban developments

C olumbus is not just expanding; it's looking to explode into national consciousness with a new tourism campaign unveiled Thursday night during the TourismUS annual meeting at the Columbus Museum of Art.

The event, hosted by Experience Columbus in conjunction with U.S. Travel Association’s National Travel and Tourism Week, brought together industry professionals and civic leaders to spotlight Columbus's growing influence in the travel and tourism sector.

Experience Columbus President and CEO Brian Ross announced the new "yes, Columbus" campaign, an initiative that seeks to reshape perceptions and entice visitors with the city's vibrant culture and unexpected attractions.

"This campaign is a declaration that Columbus is ready to emerge from the shadows of other major Midwest cities," Ross said. "It's right for the moment we’re in and for the foreseeable future."

The campaign, Ross and other speakers noted, is a concerted effort to firmly stamp Columbus' name on the map, with the goal of continuing to bolster tourism.

According to the latest data from Longwoods International, Columbus welcomed a staggering 51.2 million visitors in 2023, a record for the city, generating over $8.2 billion in local business revenue.

These visits had a broad impact, supporting approximately 82,568 jobs and generating significant tax revenues that bolster local services and development.

The evening also recognized key contributors to Columbus’s tourism industry. The inaugural Best of US Awards celebrated individuals and organizations that have significantly enriched the city’s hospitality and tourism landscape. Notable recipients included Stonewall Columbus, Inc., The Junto, Historic Trolley District, Columbus Zoo and Aquarium, and Joe Kapferer, each praised for their innovative and inclusive efforts.

Ross, along with other city leaders, spoke on future initiatives set to transform Columbus into a more vibrant, attractive destination.

"Let's talk about what's next for Columbus," Ross said during his presentation.

He detailed several urban developments that promise to redefine the cityscape. Among these is the Capital Line, a new two-mile pathway dedicated to bike and pedestrian traffic that will connect key amenities, green spaces, and job centers across downtown Columbus.

Ross also discussed the significant economic and civic benefits expected from several key projects, including the LinkUS transportation initiative, a comprehensive $2 billion expansion of the local airport, and the creation of a new fashion innovation hub.

According to Greg Davies, CEO of Downtown Columbus Inc, as Columbus embarks on these ambitious projects, the city is set to not only enhance its appeal as a tourist destination but also enrich the lives of its residents.

"There's never been a more exciting time to be in Columbus." Davies said.

[email protected]

This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Columbus unveils new tourism campaign amidst major urban developments

Local Life at an Urban Destination and Its Relevance to Tourism

• Conference paper
• First Online: 29 May 2024
• pp 1071–1081
• Cite this conference paper

• John Ebejer 3  

Part of the book series: Springer Proceedings in Business and Economics ((SPBE))

Included in the following conference series:

• International Conference of the International Association of Cultural and Digital Tourism

Even if tourists visit the well-known landmarks, more and more visitors are eager to experience and explore the local life. They seek to discover authentic aspects of a destination particularly elements related to a community’s traditions and lifestyles. ‘Live like a local’ is a promotional approach that many city destinations are adopting. In their day-to-day life, city residents engage in a broad range of activities including shopping for daily needs, leisure activities, socialising, cultural activities and religious practices. These and other community activities provide tourists the opportunity to observe local life and sometimes actively participate in it. Moreover, narrow winding roads, traditional facades and other urban features in historic areas give a local feel to a place and are perceived by tourists to be a reflection of local life. These different aspects and their relevance to tourism are considered in this paper and illustrated with examples. The paper is the outcome of the author’s own observations when visiting city destinations and his post-visit reflections, supported with relevant desk research.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Institutional subscriptions

Culture Trip. (n.d.). The best food markets in Valencia. Available at https://theculturetrip.com/europe/spain/articles/the-best-food-markets-in-valencia/ . Accessed June 18, 2023.

Dimitrovskia, D., & Crespi Vallbona, M. (2018). Urban food markets in the context of a tourist attraction—La Boqueria market in Barcelona. Tourism Geographies, 20 (3), 397–417.

Google Scholar  

Esteve, A. J. B., & Arnandis-i-Agramunt, R. (2020). Touristification in the central market of Valencia: Fact or fiction? In C. Ribeiro de Almeida, A. Quintano, M. Simancas, R. Huete, & Z. Breda (Eds.), Handbook of research on the impacts, challenges, and policy responses to overtourism (pp. 156–175). IGI Global.

Frochot, I., & Batat, W. (2013). Marketing and designing the tourist experience . Goodfellow Publishers Ltd.

Gilli, M., & Ferrari, S. (2016). The ‘diffuse hotel’: An Italian new model of sustainable hospitality. In A. Russo & G. Richards (Eds.), Reinventing the local in tourism (pp. 65–84). Channel View Publications.

Guttentag, D. (2015). Airbnb: Disruptive innovation and the rise of an informal tourism accommodation sector. Current Issues in Tourism, 18 (12), 1192–1217.

Article   Google Scholar  

Kolb, B. (2017). Tourism marketing for cities and towns: Using social media and branding to attract tourists . Routledge.

Larsen, J. (2019). Ordinary tourism and extraordinary everyday life: Rethinking tourism and cities. In T. Frisch, C. Sommer, L. Stoltenberg, & N. Stors (Eds.), Tourism and everyday life in the contemporary city (pp. 24–41). Routledge.

MacCannell, D. (1973). Staged authenticity: Arrangements of social space in tourist settings. American Journal of Sociology, 79 (3), 589–603.

Maitland, R. (2008). Conviviality and everyday life: The appeal of new areas of London for visitors. International Journal of Tourism Research, 10 , 15–25.

Nientied, P. (2021). Rotterdam and the question of new urban tourism. International Journal of Tourism Cities, 7 (2), 344–360.

Pappalepore, I., & Smith, A. (2016). The co-creation of urban tourism experiences. In A. Russo & G. Richards (Eds.), Reinventing the local in tourism (pp. 87–100). Channel View Publications.

Paulauskaite, D., Powell, R., Coca-Stefaniak, J. A., & Morrison, A. M. (2017). Living like a local: Authentic tourism experiences and the sharing economy. International Journal of Tourism Research, 19 (6), 619–628.

Richards, G. (2014). Cultural tourism 3.0. The future of urban tourism in Europe? In R. Garibaldi (Ed.), Il turismo culturale europeo. Città ri-visitate. Nuove idee e forme del turismo culturale (pp. 25–38). Franco Angeli.

Richards, G. (2021). Creative placemaking strategies in smaller communities. In K. Scherf (Ed.), Creative tourism in smaller communities: Place, culture, and local representation (pp. 283–297). University of Calgary Press.

Richards, G., & Marques, L. (2018). Creating synergies between cultural policy and tourism for permanent and temporary citizens . Committee on Culture of UCLG. Available at https://www.agenda21culture.net/ . Accessed June 1, 2023.

Richter, J. (Ed.). (2010). The tourist city Berlin: Tourism and architecture . Braun Publishing.

Scherf, K. (2021). Creative tourism in smaller communities: Place, culture, and local representation . University of Calgary Press.

Download references

Author information

Authors and affiliations.

University of Malta, Msida, Malta

John Ebejer

You can also search for this author in PubMed   Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to John Ebejer .

Editor information

Editors and affiliations.

University of West Attica, Athens, Greece

Vicky Katsoni

George Cassar

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2024 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG

About this paper

Cite this paper.

Ebejer, J. (2024). Local Life at an Urban Destination and Its Relevance to Tourism. In: Katsoni, V., Cassar, G. (eds) Recent Advancements in Tourism Business, Technology and Social Sciences. IACuDiT 2023. Springer Proceedings in Business and Economics. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-54338-8_64

Download citation

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-54338-8_64

Published : 29 May 2024

Publisher Name : Springer, Cham

Print ISBN : 978-3-031-54337-1

Online ISBN : 978-3-031-54338-8

eBook Packages : Business and Management Business and Management (R0)

Share this paper

Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:

Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.

Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative

• Publish with us

Policies and ethics

• Find a journal
• Track your research

• The Star ePaper
• Subscriptions
• Manage Profile
• Change Password
• Manage Logins
• Manage Subscription
• Transaction History
• Manage Billing Info
• Manage For You
• Manage Bookmarks
• Package & Pricing

Sabah Tourism Minister encourages incorporating nature and urban living into artwork

• Sabah & Sarawak

Sunday, 26 May 2024

Related News

Peninsula firms hired for Sabah solar plant due to lack of local expertise, says Ecos

Two new direct flights from china to sabah to be launched in june, let's focus on building up sabah pkr now that turmoil is settled, says liew.

KOTA KINABALU: State Tourism, Culture, and Environment Minister Datuk Christina Liew emphasised the capability of skilled artists to craft and install artworks reflecting the harmonious coexistence of nature and urban living.

Speaking at the launch of the "Market Below The Wind-Bamboo Forest Within Cityscape Installation" event, she suggested that incorporating natural elements into contemporary architectural designs could be extended to other commercial structures.

The collaborative initiative between KK Times Square and Upcycle Shack, curated by Sabah architect Tressie Yap, features a 3.7-metre by three-metre metal main frame adorned with uniform 2.4-metre-high hanging bamboo pieces, supported by bamboo grids above.

"As Minister of Tourism, Culture, and Environment, it fills me with immense pride to witness the convergence of art, nature, and urban life in such a harmonious and captivating manner.

“This installation is not just a piece of art, being a testament to the creative spirit and cultural richness that Sabah embodies.

"As we walk through this installation, we can feel the sensation of strolling through a dense bamboo grove, right in the heart of the city,” she said.

Liew expressed pride in witnessing the integration of art, nature, and urban life, emphasising that the fusion of metal and bamboo symbolises the potential for harmony between built and natural environments.

“The significance of bamboo, representing strength, flexibility, and growth, as a fitting material to embody the essence of the Kaamatan (harvest) festival,” said Liew, who is also the Api-Api assemblyman.

Meanwhile, Yap said advocating for the introduction of a "kampung element" bamboo forest in KK Times Square's open spaces is aimed at infusing nature into urban settings.

Also present were Syarikat Kapasi Sdn Bhd representative Kevin Loh, KK Times Square property manager Belinda Chong, and Sabah Tourism Board senior marketing manager Humphrey Ginibun.

Tags / Keywords: Sabah , Artwork , Nature , Christina Liew , Kaamatan , Nature , Urban Wellbeing

Found a mistake in this article?

Report it to us.

Thank you for your report!

MGB ACHIEVES 23% PROFIT SURGE IN Q1FYE2024

Next in nation.

Trending in News

Air pollutant index, highest api readings, select state and location to view the latest api reading.

• Select Location

Source: Department of Environment, Malaysia

Others Also Read

Best viewed on Chrome browsers.

We would love to keep you posted on the latest promotion. Kindly fill the form below

Thank you for downloading.

We hope you enjoy this feature!