dossier sur le tourisme et le développement durable

Political scope
Frame 18: The growing involvement of the private sector in tourism management
Turkey is an example of a country with growing involvement of and organisation by the private
sector in tourism development. This development has created new players such as professional
associations and local administrative bodies, who wish to be involved in the definition of objectives.
There is a need for flexibility in the designing, the management and the distribution of tourist
products for both the enterprises and the territories, and this is no longer appropriate for centralised,
hierarchical organisations. Over the last ten years a number of institutions connected with tourism
have been set up in Turkey concerning:
• investments, with the creating of the Turkish association for investors in tourism (TTIA),
• education and research, with the association for research and education in tourism (TUGEV),
financed by the private sector,
• promotion and marketing instruments grouping together public and private players on the model
of « Maison de la France ».
The difficulties for setting up these joint-ventures reside in the reticence of central administrations to
share power because of traditional centralised policies, but also because some private players wish
the State to remain involved in tourism development, especially for financing purposes.
Source: TEC, from Göymen K. (2000)
3.4. Voluntary initiatives: certification and eco-labels
Europe had 35 eco-labels for accommodation in 2000. The current direction being followed in
tourism, at least at international level, seems to be one of voluntary rather than obligatory
commitment to the contribution of tourism to sustainable development. Examples of this are the
Tour Operators’ Initiative for sustainable development (T.O.I.) in a joint-venture with the UNEP,
UNESCO, WTO, the International Hotel Environment Initiative (IHEI) that groups together most
of the large hotel chains (more than 8 000 hotel members) to take the environment into account
more. The programme Green Globe that aims at the environmental certification of enterprises
and destinations throughout the world is another example.
There is real involvement of the many players in tourism but there are limits to this involvement
due to the poor means for implementing and controlling it and the fact that these means depend
on voluntary aid. Moreover, there is insufficient awareness of some critical aspects of
sustainable development such as greenhouse effect and bio-diversity which are more prominent
examples.
These instruments, however do contribute to the awareness-raising of those involved in tourism
and help to find solutions to some environmental problems that were previously ignored,
whether the instruments take the form of codes of good conduct, charters of ethics,
environmental labels and plans, whether they are addressed at tourists, visited local
communities, travel organisers or at all of those concerned with tourism without distinction, or
whether they deal with local or global protection of the environment, with the sharing of tourism
revenue, especially in the countries of the south, or with relationships between the various
tourism professionals.
There are no regional Mediterranean initiatives in this field and the countries of the
Mediterranean are less involved in these initiatives than Germany, Great Britain, Australia or
New Zealand. Should we therefore, develop a “Mediterranean eco-label”? This involves several
risks. For example, there are currently too many eco-labels and voluntary initiatives. Consumers
get lost in the blossoming of these initiatives and cannot distinguish ambitious projects from
operations in communication. Some instruments that have been put in place are senseless;
they are merely for communication between members. This is what is known as “green
washing”, painting the activity green without changing anything.
In the same way, voluntary initiatives should not act as security against the non-intervention of
States in tourism. A study carried out by the OECD on the efficiency of voluntary approaches in
environmental policies and their combination with other intervening instruments has helped to
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