The covid-19 pandemic “brought tourism to a standstill almost overnight and now we have the opportunity to restart and rethink it,” World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) Secretary-General Zurab Pololikashvili said in a statement. interview with Efe.
“Before the crisis, as a sector, we were making excellent progress towards inclusiveness and sustainability, which we now have the opportunity to deepen and expand.”
“My vision to reinvent tourism is based on maintaining strong coordination between all actors in the sector, ensuring that we build the future in a sustainable, responsible and resilient way, encouraging new innovative models around the world to create millions of new places. Pololikashvili, who aspires to be re-elected head of the UNWTO for 2022-2025, said.
In this race, the Georgian diplomat, who took over the reins of the UNWTO in 2018, competes with the president of the Bahrain Authority for Culture and Antiquities, Mai Al Khalifa, and the choice of one of the two candidates is in the hands of the executive board of the organization, which meets on Monday and Tuesday in Madrid.
TRUST IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN EVER
According to Pololikashvili, the resumption of tourism should be a priority for destinations and governments around the world. “There is a demand to travel again, but now all actors in the public and private sectors need to work together to build trust.”
Also, the first international code for the protection of tourists that UNWTO promotes and which presupposes a legal framework that grants more rights if travel is affected by external circumstances, including health emergencies, “will ensure vital security in periods of of uncertainty ”.
Top destinations, including Spain, in his opinion, will continue to be popular, precisely because trust is more important than ever and tourists will tend to visit the places they know first.
Although vaccines are great news, “they will not in themselves resume tourism”, so they must be accompanied by measures such as health passports, which cannot be taken unilaterally, as well as decisions to introduce or lift travel restrictions, because ” it undermines trust and pushes us back. ”
The importance and value of cooperation is one of the main lessons of this crisis, which transcends tourism, and “walking alone is not an option for individual governments or the private sector,” he insisted.
A MORE EFFICIENT AND AGILE OMT
Pololikashvili came to UNWTO with a vision to make it more efficient and agile, and his priorities were resilience, innovation and public-private cooperation, as well as education and training.
“We inherited a significant financial deficit that we were able to turn into a surplus, leaving the well-positioned organization to lead tourism. We are actively incorporating innovation, which was previously talked about only before, and we created the first department dedicated to this field.” detailed the. .
UNWTO has tripled investment in technical cooperation for its members and is advancing plans to open regional offices in the Middle East, where it is already under construction in Saudi Arabia and America (Brazil), and Pololikashvili hopes that in the future it is possible to we are moving in the same direction in Africa.
Although there was already a support office for Asia and the Pacific, based in Japan, the creation of full-fledged regional offices “will bridge the gap for many years and bring UNWTO closer to its members in all regions,” he said.
CONTINUE PRIORITIZING THE INVESTMENT
Pololikashvili is committed to continuing to prioritize investment in tourism and will step up efforts to mobilize resources to help a large number of states implement technical assistance projects for sustainable and competitive growth in tourism.
“Tomorrow’s Tourism Alliance Fund” will support rural and emerging destinations, and “we aspire to raise $ 100 million in funding, connect investors with innovators and turn ideas into action.”
Asked about his rival’s proposal to create a global UNWTO assistance fund to deal with the emergency, “it is something we have already given priority to in recent years,” he explained.
“We did not need a pandemic to begin expanding UNWTO relations with donor banks and we have strengthened cooperation with various multilateral institutions, including the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, the World Bank, the African Development Bank and the Inter-American Development Bank.”
“If I repeat my mandate, I will be able to work to ensure that this potential is fully developed,” he said.
Similarly, “I have kept my promise to support current and future tourism workers,” with initiatives such as the Online Tourism Academy or the Factory of Employment, among many others.
“This will ensure that the progress made by the UNWTO during my first term will leave a legacy for the next generation,” he added.