WTTC Launches Major Hotel Sustainability Initiative

Hotel Sustainability Basics launched during WTTC’s Global Summit that was held in Manila earlier in April. Photo source: @WTTC

The World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) has launched its Hotel Sustainability Basics, a globally recognised and coordinated set of criteria that all hotels should implement as a minimum to drive responsible travel and tourism.

Launched during the Council’s Global Summit that was held in Manila, Philippines, earlier this month, the initiative will help hotels address and improve their environmental impact.

“We are launching the Hotel Sustainability Basics to ensure no hotel, however small, is left behind in the drive to introduce a basis sustainability measures within a minimum level during the next three years,” said WTTC President & CEO Julia Simpson.

Developed by the industry for the industry, Hotel Sustainability Basics highlights 12 actions which are fundamental to hotel sustainability. The criteria, developed by WTTC in close collaboration with leading global brands and industry associations, include actions to measure and reduce energy use, measure and reduce water use, identify and reduce waste, and measure and reduce carbon emissions.

The intiative also includes a linen reuse program, use of green cleaning products, the elimination of plastic straws, stirrers, and single-use plastic water bottles, the implementation of bulk amenity dispensers, as well as measures to benefit local communities.

Hotel Sustainability Basics has already gained support from major global groups such as Jin Jiang International (Holdings) Co. Ltd. including their affiliates Jin Jiang Hotels, Louvre Hotels Group and Radisson Hotel Group, Accor, Barceló Hotel Group, Meliá Hotels International, Indian Hotels Company Limited (IHCL), as well as key hotel associations around the world like the Caribbean Hotel and Tourism Association (CHTA), the Hotel Association of India (HAI), Huazhu Hotels Group and many more.

Collectively this represents more than 50,000 hotels around the world.

The WTTC is calling upon hotel operators, owners, associations, and investors around the world to officially support the initiative and work across their networks to implement the criteria over the coming three years.

Initially eight of the 12 criteria are mandatory, whilst others can be committed to and covered within the first three years.

To read more about the Hotel Sustainability Basics initiative and its 12 actions, click here.