The African Travel and Tourism Association (Atta) will publish the Atta Sustainability Charter at Experience Africa 2019 in the UK this week.
2019 has seen growing consciousness around issues of sustainability, climate change and concerns about scarcity of resources such as water, and pollution from plastics. Corporate social responsibility has become a mainstream concept in the business community.
Fiona Jeffery OBE, Chair of Atta, explains: “Sustainability within tourism is an issue that’s been on the agenda for over 25 years but only in the last 12 months has it started to become part of everyone’s day-to-day language as the impact of climate change is better understood. Africa is one of the most likely impacted continents by climate change and some African tourism businesses lead the way in terms of their commitment to protecting the environment, wildlife, biodiversity and lifting communities out of poverty.”
The charter, inspired by the 17 Sustainable Development Goals, outlines ten principles specific to the African tourism context and encourages its members to endorse them and put them into practice.
The Atta Sustainability Charter also works within an internationally agreed global framework for tourism by following the UN Sustainability Goals, the UNWTO Global Code of Ethics and the Global Sustainable Tourism Criteria.
The full charter can be found here on the Atta website.
