Accelerating the Path to Net Positive Hospitality
Our five-year strategy
Our commitment to creating a prosperous and responsible hospitality sector that gives back to the destination more than it takes
Our vision
A prosperous and responsible hospitality sector that gives back to the destination more than it takes.
Our mission
To accelerate the path to Net Positive Hospitality through strategic industry leadership, collaborative action, harmonisation of metrics and regenerative solutions.
Making our vision a reality
The travel and tourism industry plays a vital role in the global economy, accounting for up to 70% of GDP in some countries1. However, it also generates significant costs, including emissions, biodiversity loss, inequality, and informal employment. Shifting to a net positive model means actively causing positive impacts on the environment and society across our facilities and supply chain while minimising costs.
More than traditional sustainability practices are now required. We must adopt a holistic approach to positively impact the environment, society, and the economy, rather than simply minimising impacts.
To develop our strategy and work plan, we worked closely with our donor members, partners, and sustainability stakeholders to identify issues impacting the hospitality industry. We undertook a robust participatory process to understand industry priorities, capabilities, and constraints and defined a set of strategic initiatives that address these and deliver on our vision and mission.
There is much work to be done, but considerable opportunities to be unlocked. The Alliance is uniquely positioned to address these challenges and potential. We have set a high vision for the industry to achieve, but our ability to convene will help to clarify priorities and inspire, support and drive the industry to deliver on these.
We welcome everyone to join us on this journey.
Our goals
Measurement
Work collaboratively to harmonise metrics and KPIs, develop standards and streamline reporting and benchmarking in sustainability.
Leadership
Position the Alliance as the authoritative voice in sustainability for the global hospitality industry and accelerate progress through bold and strategic leadership, innovation, entrepreneurship and collaboration.
Regenerative solutions
Facilitate a collaborative approach to achieving Net Positive Hospitality through co-ordinating and developing innovative, practical and scalable solutions, tools and resources.
Strategic initiatives
The strategy advances a comprehensive approach to achieving Net Positive Hospitality, consisting of three key components.
Net Positive Pathway
An action-focused Net Positive Pathway outlining a shared vision and actions, combined with a shared definition of sustainability standards, supported by an Academy platform to equip the industry to translate vision into action.
High Ambition Movers
Bringing together high-ambition Alliance members to forge bold commitments and/or partnerships that leverage their market power to drive catalytic shifts towards net positive and investment into innovations or destinations.
Accelerators
Leveraging Alliance members’ operations to design and deploy pilot initiatives targeting systemic issues in specific destinations alongside public and private sector partners to create replicable and scalable solutions.
Cross-cutting functions
Each initiative will draw on cross-cutting functions to deliver outcomes effectively:
Knowledge sharing: generating and sharing knowledge assets and tools
Communications and storytelling: positioning the industry as a sustainability leader to influence broader conversations
Hear from industry leaders
The Sustainable Hospitality Alliance has built a 30-year legacy of uniting industry leaders in pursuit of a better world. Our priority is now to translate our vision into action and deliver meaningful interventions that leverage our unique characteristics as an ambitious industry coalition and inspire the industry towards a prosperous and responsible future.
Introducing our five-year strategy
For full details of our commitment to create a prosperous and responsible hospitality sector that gives back to the destination more than it takes, please view our five-year strategy.
Acknowledgements
To develop our strategy and work plan, we’ve worked closely with our donor members, partners, and other key sustainability stakeholders. We thank everyone for the time and enthusiasm that they each put into this process and look forward to going on this journey together.
We’d also like to thank our strategic partners, Systemiq, EY and Tourism Planning Group, who supported the development of this strategy.
References
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Expand for details
- Systemiq analysis based on World Travel and Tourism Council, McKinsey and Statista data
