Tourism stakeholders are increasingly concerned with the sustainability of the sector, especially in the face of challenges including recovery from the pandemic, the climate emergency and geopolitical conflict. In tourism and beyond, people are also more aware of the ability of tourism to advance – or even reverse – progress towards the United Nations Sustainable Development agenda. Tourism is mentioned explicitly in three of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs): SDG 8 on growth and decent work, SDG 12 on sustainable consumption and production, and SDG 14 on sustainable oceans (in targets 8.9, 12.b and 14.7 respectively) – and the World Tourism Organization firmly believes that tourism can play a role in the achievement of all 17 SDGs.
Tourism is a social, cultural and economic phenomenon. It relies on and has an impact on the economy, the natural and built environment, the local population of places visited and on visitors themselves. Owing to this range of impacts and the wide spectrum of stakeholders involved, there is a need for a holistic approach to tourism measurement.
However, the data available on tourism – and the scope of the existing international statistical standards for measuring tourism that underpins this data – is largely focussed on the economic dimension. There is a need to expand the scope of tourism statistics into the social and environmental dimensions, while also rethinking the economic measurement of tourism through the lens of sustainability.
Tourism has an opportunity to redefine how it measures success. In the words of Joseph Stiglitz: “What we measure affects what we do and if we measure the wrong thing, we will do the wrong thing”.
Feasible, relevant, and reliable metrics are increasingly necessary to understand the economic, social and environmental aspects of tourism for sustainable development. These measures need to be produced in a harmonized way across countries and destinations so as to communicate progress effectively, benchmark performance, identify best practices and streamline tourism in sustainable development policy and funding mechanisms.
The Measuring the Sustainability of Tourism (MST) programme – led by the World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) in partnership with the United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) and leading countries, and with the support of the International Labour Organization (ILO) and others – aims to provide an internationally agreed framework to measure the impacts and dependencies of tourism on the economy, society and the environment, both at national and subnational levels.
The Statistical Framework for Measuring the Sustainability of Tourism under development provides the main concepts, definitions, classifications, tables, and accounts to underpin the production of data and indicators that are comparable over time between countries, and to data on other economic sectors.
This guidance tool will support efforts to produce data that is more comparable, credible and integrated to better guide decisions and policy with respect to sustainable tourism, including the Sustainable Development Goals.
Tourism stakeholders are increasingly concerned with the sustainability of the sector, especially in the face of challenges including recovery from the pandemic, the climate emergency and geopolitical conflict. In tourism and beyond, people are also more aware of the ability of tourism to advance – or even reverse – progress towards the United Nations Sustainable Development agenda. Tourism is mentioned explicitly in three of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs): SDG 8 on growth and decent work, SDG 12 on sustainable consumption and production, and SDG 14 on sustainable oceans (in targets 8.9, 12.b and 14.7 respectively) – and the World Tourism Organization firmly believes that tourism can play a role in the achievement of all 17 SDGs.
Tourism is a social, cultural and economic phenomenon. It relies on and has an impact on the economy, the natural and built environment, the local population of places visited and on visitors themselves. Owing to this range of impacts and the wide spectrum of stakeholders involved, there is a need for a holistic approach to tourism measurement.
However, the data available on tourism – and the scope of the existing international statistical standards for measuring tourism that underpins this data – is largely focussed on the economic dimension. There is a need to expand the scope of tourism statistics into the social and environmental dimensions, while also rethinking the economic measurement of tourism through the lens of sustainability.
Tourism has an opportunity to redefine how it measures success. In the words of Joseph Stiglitz: “What we measure affects what we do and if we measure the wrong thing, we will do the wrong thing”.
Feasible, relevant, and reliable metrics are increasingly necessary to understand the economic, social and environmental aspects of tourism for sustainable development. These measures need to be produced in a harmonized way across countries and destinations so as to communicate progress effectively, benchmark performance, identify best practices and streamline tourism in sustainable development policy and funding mechanisms.
The Measuring the Sustainability of Tourism (MST) programme – led by the World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) in partnership with the United Nations Statistics Division (UNSD) and leading countries, and with the support of the International Labour Organization (ILO) and others – aims to provide an internationally agreed framework to measure the impacts and dependencies of tourism on the economy, society and the environment, both at national and subnational levels.
The Statistical Framework for Measuring the Sustainability of Tourism under development provides the main concepts, definitions, classifications, tables, and accounts to underpin the production of data and indicators that are comparable over time between countries, and to data on other economic sectors.
This guidance tool will support efforts to produce data that is more comparable, credible and integrated to better guide decisions and policy with respect to sustainable tourism, including the Sustainable Development Goals.
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