Rio+20 : Submission

In order to move from words to action, and thinking on the level of using the Rio + 20 process to help to shape a peace-based, global green economy to meet current world-wide challenges, this paper presents a clear strategy to achieve this by prioritizing sectoral activity related to tourism sustainable consumption and production. Its offers a practical outcome ofor Rio+20, building a showcase Global Mosaic of Responsible, Sustainable and Competitive Tourism and then planning to use large-scale events to mainstream peace, responsibility and sustainability messages through developing this mosaic. This mosaic would model a solutions-based approach to restructuring the global economy as global peace-based, green economy, using tourism stakeholder activities�� cross- cutting socio-economic power as an instrument for sustainable development, as well as ensuring the sustainability and competitiveness of local and global tourism offers in an uncertain future. It calls for the governments who signed the Olympic Truce Resolution this October 2011, who are also attending Rio +20 to work together to shape an international sustainable tourism campaign the delivers a map of the global responsible and sustainable tourism offer as a strategic path to the green economy. The UN Type II DestiNet Partnership set up after WSSD in 2003 and working on item 43 of the JPoI, has been dealing with these issues for the past decade, and can report on how this can be achieved as an outcome of the UN Agenda 21 Rio+20 event in June next year.

The outcome of Rio should have a very practical working model of sustainable production and consumption, a solutions-based model that takes into account current food, financial and environmental crises and the Millennium goals targets. The mosaic of the sustainable tourism supply chain, including businesses, destinations and travellers good practice shows a path to global cultural and environmental exchange, and economic equity. The aim would be to invite governments to shape this model for Rio+20 and then mainstream the message by the London Olympics in July-August 2012, bringing together the dimension of the need for a peace based global economy that moves us form a culture of violence to a culture of peace. Therefore Rio+20 should declare the six week Olympic Truce period that UN Members have just voted for as a time to mobilize inter-cultural exchange as a catalyst for sustainable development, using tourism and sport to bring the sustainable development agenda a mass audience to speed up progress on the millennium goals.

This proposal is based on Ecotrans Network for Sustainable Tourism Development participation in WSSD 2002 and the authors�� previous engagement in WSSD in Johannesburg in 2002 when working as a Commission staff member of DG Enterprise Tourism Unit alongside the EU team of 50 people listed to attend, and now acting as executive director of the DestiNet Sustainable Tourism Portal UN Type II Partnership. See www.destinet.eu .

Background - Development of the DestiNet UN Type II Partnership

Guided by Agenda 21 and EU SDS I & II implementation policy lines, the European Environment Agency followed through on the WSSD by creating a UN Type II Partnership with the UN WTO, UNEP and the Ecotrans Network for Sustainable Tourism Development, with the aim of building a portal for sustainable tourism knowledge networking to achieve the WSSD plan of implementation. In 2005, the Portal was further specified in DG Enterprises�� innovation in tourism process as a knowledge networking tool to develop learning areas and regional clusters in the field of tourism-based sustainable consumption and production. Now the Portal has been through an 8 year development cycle, is operating at a global scale, and is host to the Commissions�� latest efforts in the field of sustainability and competitiveness to develop a European-level virtual tourism observatory concept and on-the �Vground, working regional tourism innovation clusters in Europe.

In March 2011 the DestiNet Portal team demonstrated a complete supply chain mosaic of sustainable tourism at Berlins ITB1. Currently the Portal houses a growing list of 387 European examples of certified and awarded sustainable tourism products and services in its Best Practice Atlas of Excellence (the worldwide database contains over 500 examples). Included in this are 70 EDEN award winners - shortly to be updated to list all 98 current winners. This forms the world��s leading best practice knowledge base to showcasing the field of sustainable tourism

Introduction: Progress Assessment, Remaining Gaps - Agenda 21/WSSD follow through

Helping to shape the next ten years of global policy-making at Rio+20, this proposal deals with a decade of policy and market developments in the field of sustainable tourism, providing a contribution to planning actions centred on Agenda 21/SDS follow through at Rio+20 and the London Olympics next June and July 2012. The UN has set the agenda of Rio +20 to focus on the two key themes �V the Green Economy and Institutional Change. To face multiple challenges of economic and social instability, increasing levels of violence and civil wars, climate change, etc, the concept of a peace-based, knowledge-driven green global economy will be a strong feature of Rio+20, as will the value system of good governance. The EU has been a leading force in many respects on these issues, being founded on the concept of forging European peace, creating a global knowledge economy for its businesses and citizens, and heading the world in terms of certified green tourism businesses and protected area networking, within the framework of its own SDS good governance process.

As part of a synthesis of a decade of the Agenda 21/EU SDS implementation efforts of UN, EU, national, regional, local governments, global businesses, NGOs and other civil society groups - all working on sustainable development issues, this action is designed to meet long term Agenda 21 and WSSD policy coherence, following through on stakeholders WSSD commitments,. At the same time it provides support for a number of existing initiatives by creating synergy though their combination.

Sectoral Priority -Building the Green Economy through Showcasing Sustainable Tourism

The frameworks of both the green economy and institutional change discussions taking place in the run up to Rio+20 will both be better informed though the action Taking Sustainable Tourism Small Businesses to the Global Stage �V A Mosaic of the Global Green Economy. Using tourism activity as a motor for the green economy and institutional change, the aim to would be to develop a global mosaic of responsible, sustainable and competitive tourism as part of the national contributions to Rio+20 and the London Olympics.

Promoting the Mosaic - Specific Cooperation Mechanisms

Under the heading �� Taking Sustainable Tourism Small Businesses to the Global Stage �V A Mosaic of the Global Green Economy��, a map of international certified and awarded tourism destinations, products and services can be developed and then showcased at Rio+20 and the London Olympics. The global offering of peaceful, green, diverse tourism destinations of excellence can be broadcast by taking certified SMEs to the international market place at these two events alongside other certified and awarded tourism products and services. Rio+20 and the Olympics bring the theme of human excellence and our greatest challenges together, and the temporal coincidence of the two globally significant events next year offers great potential.

In order to realize this action, the following practical ideas can be implemented:

1) This knowledge can be attractively displayed as a stand with promotional paper-based and audio-visual material, and delivered at the Rio+20 event.

2) A series of short commercial style video adverts for sustainable tourism destinations can be made, linking destinations of excellence to relevant Olympic athletes and prominent politicians supporting tourism, culture, peace and sporting initiatives (cf Hungarian president, Lord Sebastian Coe).

3) A workshop at Rio+20 can be held on the theme of sustainable and competitive business development based on tourism, showcasing examples of excellence throughout the overall tourism supply chain and in destination good governance.

4) A short video on the role of tourism in creating peace can be made, calling for a peaceful global world in which all nations and their citizens can benefit from better tourism business the world over.

5) A partnership strategy can be used to broadcast the materials in Rio and then in London. Partners would include media, tourism business stakeholders, NTOs, NGOs and global institutes.

Modeling an Institutional Framework with Agenda 21 Good Governance Values �V Prosperity through Peace for People in Need

The key messages of Johannesburg were based on the slogan ��People, Prosperity and Planet��, moving the narrower initial focus of sustainable development on environment to include broader socio-economic and cultural sustainability. Ten years on, we have identified that a peace-based global economy can deliver 2 trillion dollars a year to the global economy with a 25% reduction in conflict1. It is this money that could be used to construct a new institutional framework of sustainable development that would be fleshed out with agricultural, industrial, energy and transport sustainability innovations around the global to local tourism supply chain and destination management Infrastructure.

The process to achieve this this would involve helping make the London Olympics a time of global peace �V using the six weeks of designated peace during the Olympic competition as a contribution to realize the Millennium goals, and to celebrate the best of human nature whilst creating a unique business opportunity for global responsible/sustainable tourism in participating countries. If linked to Rio+20, the London 2012 Games will open the floodgates of cultural understanding and exchange in the spirit of the Millennium Declaration. A tourism bonanza can be created during the Olympic media coverage of each country, to put responsible and sustainable tourism businesses and destinations from Africa, Asia, Latin America and elsewhere on the international consumer map2. This action would benefit both residents as visitors and host countries as global destinations. In the spirit of making the national contribution to tourism activity and development more responsible, sustainable and competitive, each participating country can profile its responsible/sustainable tourism offers in an Olympic showcase of the best that country has to offer on a safe and welcoming global tourism trail. This second map (alongside the map of Global Destinations of Excellence) canl be created for the Rio+20 event and as preparation for the Olympics, aiming to show how the Agenda 21/WSSD sustainable tourism process is developing globally, and then take it to mainstream markets.

Three specific actions to achieve this would be:

?h Support for a Responsible & Sustainable Tourism Business & Destination Support Travel Initiative - showcasing community-based responsible and sustainable tourism best practice offers next to a country��s Olympic icons. Responsible tourism can be targeted at the poorest nations of Earth to give a boost for local communities to benefit from global tourism opportunities for economic, cultural and environmental recovery.

?h Support for the VISTAS Peace through Tourism Award3 �V an international award to highlight those countries which works most towards to Peace, with the aim of developing the peace-based green global economy.

?h Use the Global Peace Index4 as the basis for monitoring the Olympic peace after Rio+20, as a practical outcome of Rio +20,and further develop the DestiNet UN Type II Partneship Sustainable Tourism Platform as technical tools to manage the implementation.

Conclusion

To avoid being seen as just a talking shop process, the outcome of Rio should have a very practical working model of sustainable production and consumption, a model that takes into account current food, financial and environmental crises and the Millennium goals targets. This proposal shows the possibility of the creation of a mosaic of the sustainable tourism supply chain, including businesses, destinations and travellers good practice showing a path to global cultural and environmental exchange, and economic equity. The aim would be to invite governments to shape this model for Rio+20 and then mainstream the message by the London Olympics in July-August 2012, bringing together the dimension of the need for a peace based global green economy that moves us form a culture of violence to a culture of peace. Therefore Rio+20 should declare the six week Truce period that UN Members have just voted for as a specific time to mobilize inter- cultural exchange as a catalyst for sustainable development, using tourism and sport to bring the sustainable development agenda a mass audience to speed up progress on the millennium goals.

Please contact Gordon Sillence or Herbert Hamele to discuss this proposal further.

Gordon.destinet@ecotrans.de Herbert.hamele@ecotrans.de www.destinet.eu