Tourism sector as a driver of economic growth, affecting the development in environmental sustainability sector, has a strong impact in many social / economical areas, such as labour, environmental issues, cultural integration, nutrition habits homogenization, social cohesion, agriculture economy, telecommunication compatibility, construction innovations’ diffusion, etc.
UNWTO encourages the implementation of the «Global Code of Ethics for Tourism», to maximize tourism’s socio-economic contribution while minimizing its possible negative impacts, and is committed to promoting tourism as an instrument in achieving the geared towards reducing poverty and fostering sustainable development.
Over the decades, tourism has experienced continued growth and deepening diversification to become one of the fastest growing economic sectors in the world. Modern tourism is closely linked to development and encompasses growing number of new destinations. These dynamics have turned tourism into a key driver for socio-economic progress.
Today, the business volume of tourism equals or even surpasses that of oil exports, food products or automobiles. Tourism has become one of the major players in international commerce, and represents at the same time one of the main income sources for many developing countries. This growth implies an increasing diversification and competition among destinations.
After achieving an historic milestone in 2012 – of one billion people travelling the world in a single year – international tourism continued its momentum with a 5% growth in 2013 and 2014, or in other words, an additional 52 million international tourists / year, bringing up the world total to a record number of 1,087 million arrivals.
Despite the ongoing global economic challenges and geopolitical changes, international tourism results were above expectations and long term forecasts. Regions that showed the strongest demand for international tourism in 2013 and 2014 were Asia and the Pacific (+6%), Africa (+6%) and Europe (+5%), while the leading sub-regions were Southeast Asia (+10%), Central and Eastern Europe (+7%), Southern and Mediterranean Europe (+6%) and North Africa (+6%).
In relative terms, growth was higher in Asia and the Pacific (+6%), where the number of international tourists grew by 14 million to reach 248 million. Spearheading this growth was South East Asia (+10%), whilst moderate results were seen in South Asia (+5%), Oceania and North-East Asia (+4% each).
The Americas (+4%) saw an increase of six million arrivals, reaching a total of 169 million. Leading this growth were destinations in North and Central America (+4% each), while South America (+2%) and the Caribbean (+1%) showed some slowdown comparing to previous years’ results.
Africa (+6%) attracted three million additional arrivals, reaching a new record of 56 million, reflecting the ongoing rebound in North Africa (+6%) and the sustained growth of Sub-Saharan destinations (+5%).
Results in the Middle East (+0% at 52 million) were rather mixed and volatile.
The contribution of tourism to economic prosperity depends on the quality and the revenues of the tourism offer. Quality is the main factor affecting revenues and destination recognition.
Service quality in tourism industry has been examined in many different types of business enterprises. Aspects of service quality can be divided into two main categories: tangible and intangible. Tangible aspects of service quality include the exterior and interior design of hotels, the established equipment and the ambient conditions in the hotels’ environment. On the other hand, the intangible aspects of service quality are those factors that are not touched; they include reliability, responsiveness, assurance and empathy. In common language we define the two aspects of quality in hospitality, as Technical Quality and Operational Quality.
Hotels Classification is the only tool that is currently available, to improve quality in both aspects. Classification Systems are a kind of Guarantee that the service provided is conformed to what was expected and described, as well as that service delivery satisfies Customer Needs.
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Hotels Classification is just one of our competitive advantages.