Guest essay by Eric Worrall
The World Travel and Tourism Council meeting in Buenos Aires has announced a formal partnership with the UNFCCC to jointly tackle climate damage caused by global tourism.
WTTC AND UN CLIMATE CHANGE IN NEW PARTNERSHIP TO TACKLE GLOBAL WARMING
APRIL 26, 2018
ENVIRONMENT / TOURISM
The World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC) and the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UN Climate Change) have agreed a common agenda for climate action in tourism.
Agreed at the WTTC Global Summit in Buenos Aires, Argentina last week, the partnership backs goals set by the Paris Agreement to maintain temperature levels at 2 degrees above pre-industrial levels, and the economic importance of tourism to the world’s economy (10% of GDP and one in 10 jobs), the Common Agenda sets out a framework for the two organisations to recognise and address the linkages between tourism and climate change.
Announcing the agreement, Patricia Espinosa, Executive Secretary of UN Climate Change advised “this is the first time the tourism sector has actively engaged on a global level with the UN Climate agenda.
“We recognise that tourism has a huge role to play in addressing climate change. While climate change itself poses significant risks to some tourism destinations, in many of the most high-risk areas, tourism can provide opportunities for communities to build resilience to its impacts. At the same time, as a fast-growing sector, tourism has a responsibility to ensure this growth is sustainable and sits within the parameters set by the Paris Agreement.
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The WTTC press release is available here
Sadly this partnership may add to the moral burden of climate scientists, who already accumulate substantial air miles attending conferences in exotic holiday destinations like Paris, Cancun and Davos.
Personal inspections of environmentally endangered eco-tourist hotspots will likely be required, maybe even a rota of permanent monitoring in the most sensitive locations, to ensure places of special ecological significance are properly preserved.
I suspect they’re following the principle that if you don’t have a seat at the table, then you’re on the menu.
East German commies were never too keen on proles being free to leave the country either. Watermellons will be watermellons.
Holidays are banned ’til morale improves.
Shut down all non-essential air travel. Restrict it to g’ment. operatives and the military. Easy-peasy!
Maybe the UNFCCC will employ biased staffers at each of the major tourist destinations to provide scary updates on the evil tourists contributing to GloBULL Warming.
Ah, Buenos Aires! Not far off being one of the four corners of the world, a very appropriate place to demonstrate virtue signaling.
WUWT is going to have to go some to come up with a funnier story this week!
How can an industry that utterly depends upon fossil-fuel powered transport over vast distances even pretend to be concerned with CO2 emissions?
I’d love to hear an explanation!
That’s what I thought. This one sent the hypocrisy-ometer to 11.
Dependent on fossil fuel? Heavens no!!! In the future all tourist transport to and from the Maldives will be by trireme. All passengers will be expected to participate in two four-hour shifts at the oars each day. Gourmet refreshments will be served.
OK, just cleaned my monitor!
+10e7
Triremes require too much wood, causing excess deforestation . Must use biremes or, better yet, dugout canoes (from deadfall logs, of course).
Blimps, and I don’t mean the primo blimp himself.
Whether the travel industry can cut CO2 emissions or not is irrelevant. It is of no consequence.
What is important, and this is vitally important, is that they are seen to care.
The WTTC is trying to play the appeasement and complacency card. They have not learned the lesson from oil companies who have been trying to do the same. It’s just one more example of the religion of man-made climate change continuing to make inroads, despite increasingly successful attacks from climate realists on the science supporting said religion.
Several people have suggested that the tourism industry is doing this for the publicity. That may be the case, but it may also be the case that people will begin to choose companies or destinations that show “CO2 awareness,” and it CERTAINLY is about the dangers faced by the industry. Think of how many beachfront resorts there are, or island getaways. Much of their interest will be in adaptation, I imagine. How can the beaches and properties be protected without hindering the view? Who bears the cost? The engineering and construction needed to protect the world’s oceanside cities from a meter rise in sea level would be phenomenal. Skeptics scoff, of course. But what if you’re wrong?
Really, folks, just think about it for a little while. What if the sea level rises by 3 feet by 2100? That’s 82 years from now, a single lifetime. Millions of people displaced from the Miami area alone. There is no building sea barriers there because the water percolates up through the land. And the Bayou? New Orleans? Forget it.
It could happen.
Kristy: It could happen.
No. There is not enough energy we can avoid to release into the environment to keep so much ice from melting. Even when we burn nothing at all.
Pretending is what the Global Warming Cabal does best. This shouldn’t surprise anybody!
What comes to mind is the phrase: “Oh, what a wicked web we weave…
“How can an industry that utterly depends upon fossil-fuel powered transport over vast distances even pretend to be concerned with CO2 emissions?”
By justifying jamming more seats into an airplane!! Lowers carbon footprint doncha know. The effect on profit margin is only coincidental.
Someone is being set up for a shakedown.
+1 and it’s obvious. How far does anyone believe this alliance can go before the tourist destinations realize they are being scammed?
Airlines and luxury resorts will have to add a climate mitigation tax to the bill.
There’s that undefined ‘climate change’ again. Must be some bad stuff, since the UN is skeert.
If global tourism causes climate change… Wouldn’t climate refugees also cause climate change?
One Syrian in Northern Europe has far larger a carbon dioxide footprint than one Syrian in any warm country. But, they want them here because it is a way to punish the bourgoise, i.e. anyone who works.
Of course, Syrians are not climate refugees. They might be refugees from Assad and the religion of peace. Sad that they tend to bring their troubles with them.
Both parties will benefit. Tourism will be protected so that this important industry can generate enough money for locals to “adapt” to climate change. The UN will figure out a way to enact some tourism tax for the coffers to help “mitigate” climate change. TeeDerTotter!
But refugees contribute less than half as much as tourists. Tourists have round-trip tickets. And travel regularly. Refugees only travel to arrive at their selected destination.
There have been innumerable cases of “refugees” visiting the country which they “fled” from. The persecution they suffered in their native lands apparently stops as soon as they are granted refugee status. They also find the need to travel between many “safe” countries before applying for asylum wherever the social benefits are most generous, with the added benefits also creating a larger “carbon footprint”.
Waffle words. I wonder how long they took to get the composition right so it reads well to the believers.
I think the UNFCCC will have their
holidaydestinations subsidised for some time. I’m sure climate change meetings must be held near the the tourist attractions of the world. Not like in Austin, Texas, or just somewhere in Delaware.“Climate damage” — seriously? Is earth’s climate really such a fragile, delicate flower — or is it a massive, powerful force that belittles us into insignificance?
BallBounces
Shhhhhhhhhhh……….you’ll scare the snowflakes.
“Is earth’s climate really such a fragile, delicate flower … ”
From what I can gather, Earth’s temperatures for yesterday ranged between: 50.3C and -71.7C, yet a purported 1.8C shift has us teetering on the brink of extinction?
Stop confusing weather with climate. It makes my head hurt.
Anyone interested can see the agenda in microcosm by understanding “The Yosemite Plan.” Restricting access and making the income decline up by raising the costs so that only the rich can fully participate. Note. Despite being soundly rejected via public outcry, the entirety of The Yosemite Plan is being implemented piecemeal and under the radar.
Well goodbye to holidays in the Maldives then, unless you go there by sailing boat, made out of recycled paperclips. And no permisson to enter harbour showing 500 kg of collected plastic waste from the sea.
The airport will be closed and officially designated as “Imperialistic climate destruction project forced on the Maldives”.
“And no permisson to enter harbour WITHOUT showing..”
The WTTC is an industry group whose purpose is to promote tourism and advocate for the (international?) tourist industry. As far as I can tell, they’re legit. link
In the recent WUWT story on the Maldives, someone noted the conflicting interests: They want climate cash and they depend on tourism. My guess is that the WTTC isn’t acting out of the goodness of their hearts. They have a vested interest in making sure that CAGW alarmism doesn’t bork their industry. We have only to look to Venezuela to see how a zealot can mess things up. The WTTC has to find ways to keep the tourism industry off the zealots’ radars. Looking like they are doing something about CAGW is one way.
On a related matter, the country of Greenland has determined that a one-degree temperature rise has decimated their winter tourist season. They will sue Exxon and Shell.
Perhaps the IPCC and WTTC should consider the destination Hot Spot of Pripyat, Ukraine for their next meeting spot.
Enough vacant housing for 50,000
Warm nights
And everyone would be Aglow after the conferences were over
They could stock the welcoming committee with ISIS and Mexican drug cartel members.
If they are serious, they’ll simply ban tourism. WTTC instead of dissolving itself, will become an arm of IPCC. That way no sinecures will be lost.
“Flying to a different continent should be a once-in-a-lifetime experience” said Earthfirst! 15 years ago. Let the “nudging” begin.
They will probably set up a market in negative air miles. Those flying would need to buy these to qualify for a seat. Plenty of airy fairy money floating about for someone. (:sark
So if I planned to fly to Spain this summer but decided not to, may I then sell my unused air miles to someone else. Obviously they would also have to purchase a ticket.
Get ready for an international surcharge on air travel.
Those folk traveling to climate change conferences will be exempt of course as they are working to fix it.
Sarc or not sarc, only time will tell.
+10
This is the UN version of Obama era tokenism of agencies and their queuing pattern of public press announcements for meaningless climate change statements.
What are they going to tell people? Stay at home, don’t drive, fly, or eat? And no romantic getaways because we don’t want the possibility of accidentally causing procreation.
Geez. Is the flying saucer coming soon?
Norfolk Island has already been used to trial tourism vs carbon credits:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/australiaandthepacific/australia/8092210/Norfolk-Island-to-trial-worlds-first-personal-carbon-trading-scheme.html
I cannot find any results of this ‘research’ – can anyone find it?