Global National Happiness or despair: it is up to us

And this is what just one of my ten tonnes per annum of CO2 looks like

Nobody got into travel and tourism to make people unhappy, did they?

And yet shortly we’re going to be the globe’s least happy industry unless something radical happens pretty quickly.

Why? Because within 40 or 50 years, if forecasts are correct, destinations will have disappeared, millions will go hungry and thirsty and mass migrations will rampage the world in search of sustenance leaving desolation behind them.

All because of travel and tourism – the world’s happy-making industry?  No, not all because of travel and tourism but, according to Professor Stefan Gossling in his recent book, travel and tourism already is responsible for 13,200 deaths, is seriously affecting the livelihoods of 14.3 million people and delivering economic losses of $5.5billion as its current annual share of the global warming cost. As the global warming disaster nears you can only imagine what this will increase to.

So, what do we do? Stop flying? Stop travelling? Stop selling holidays? That way instead of 14 million people having their livelihoods affected some 500 million people would lose their jobs. How many would that kill? And as far as economic losses are concerned, what about $1,000 billion, not $5.5billion. Annually.

Focused on today and the problems of tomorrow, we forget where travel and tourism has its roots:
People travelled for religious and spiritual pilgrimages – still big business today – the Hajj must still be one of the biggest movements of people in the world.

People travelled to educate themselves, initially on Grand Tours restricted to rich folk, but subsequently, the advent of Thos Cook made cultural pilgrimages available to a massive global public two centuries ago.

People travelled for their health, to mountain resorts, to spas, to the seaside – for recuperation and recreation. And still do.

People travelled to trade, and the handshake is still the most effective method of doing business that exists.

Then, in the 1960’s, a combination of cheap fuel and cheap hotel investment loans, made it possible for millions of ordinary people to travel internationally each year just to ‘Get away from it all and enjoy themselves’

Nobody is going to question the motivation, are they? Sanctity, education, health, business and enjoyment, are pretty laudable ambitions on the whole.

And the effect has been, largely,  OK too. All these tourists, last year created about $800billion of revenue for hotels, restaurants, shops etc and this money went partly to employ and pay some 500million people in destinations. Many of whom would have nothing to do at all if it weren’t for tourism. That’s right – no income, no food.

Plus the opportunity cost. Travel and tourism delivers much more than money doesn’t it? And it could deliver much, much, much more.

What price the happiness and relaxation of a billion tourists a year? What price the happiness of a half a billion people in regular employment? What price the opportunity to replace cultural and racial bigotry with friendship and communication through personal experience? What price the opportunities for world peace? What price the opportunity for disempowered people to gain inclusion through directed tourism development?

We have a serious threat on our hands called ‘Global Warming’ caused by global carbon emissions of which tourism’s share is up to 12.5% (of which air transport share is around 40%).

If we don’t get it right all bets are off and we won’t have a stable world to do tourism in at all.

And we’ll get it in the neck – cajoling, aiding and abetting a billion tourists a year to pollute the atmosphere and spur the world to its early demise simply for ‘pleasure’ will put us all in the same category as drug dealers or cigarette manufacturers in the eyes of the global media.

So what do we do?

As far as carbon and other greenhouse gases are concerned, talking for myself – and I think that it’s important to start here – I now monitor my carbon in the same way I meter my water, my gas and my electric.  Last year my personal carbon emissions were 9.23 tonnes of CO2, (assessed by the Energy Savings Trust) – that’s just one tonne less than the UK average, but greatly swayed by my travel-related emissions at 8.73 tonnes (just over double the UK average).

So my task in 2011 is to get down to 8.31 tonnes or less

Overall I am now committed to reducing my overall carbon/GHG emissions by 10% this year on last. When I achieve this target at the end of 2011, and with a better knowledge of the challenges – I will see what more I can do.

As far as the broader tourism industry is concerned – I guess that we all need to take a hard look at what we do and why we do it.

There are two issues:

The first is that since the onset of the throw-away society, tourism has been has been sold as hollow sets of vacuous, unfulfilling experiences, devalued by our ‘pile it high sell it cheap’ marketing. Maybe a carbon culture, and a fuel price spike will cause us all to revalue and re-assess our products – this may be what the UNWTO defines as Smart Tourism but it’s certainly sensible and sustainable tourism marketing.

The second is that tourism’s attitude to the outside world and its PR is absolute rubbish. We really need to emphasise and use tourism’s benefits as a sustainable, multi-sectoral development mechanism to catalyze our world’s movement out of economic trauma and into the coming green economy.

We really need to push tourism’s potential as a deliverer of socially-beneficial things such as cultural exchange, society-building, philanthropy, experiential education and training, environmental awareness and, in particular its powerful ability to generate happiness.
If the green economy is to be valued as much by its ability to generate social welfare and happiness as by its ability to deliver hard cash and economic activity, then tourism must be recognized as a key part of this function.

Maybe then we can all start smiling again.

Valere Tjolle
Valere Tjolle is the editor of the Sustainable Tourism Report Suite latest special offer: www.travelmole.com/stories/1146327.php