Beyond Greening - Tourism Watch

Beyond Greening: Reflections on Tourism in the Rio-Process | Positioningpaperthe tourism industry (not only hotels, but also transport, food, materials, and destinationservices) generates between four and ten percent of total GHG emissions. Much of tourism'sclimate footprint is related to air transport, which generates up to 75 percent of the sector'semissions. The United Nations, in a sector-specific study, concluded that tourism held up to14 percent of global responsibility (Simpson et al, 2008, p. 66). According to the UnitedNations, in an unsustainable climate scenario (a rise of between +3°C and +5°C intemperature), the tourism sector's share of responsibility would be between ten percent and 20percent by 2050. If rapid progress were made to ensure a minimum climate scenario (limitingthe increase in global temperatures over the same period to +2°C), the impact of tourismwould be more than 50 percent (UNEP/MAP/BLUE PLAN, 2008, p. 62).For a shared Mediterranean agenda on climate justiceOn the eve of the end of the term of the Kyoto Treaty, Mediterranean societies are facing anuncertain and dangerous future with neither institutions nor collaborative tools that wouldhelp to promote a social and climatic transition aimed at ensuring humane, democratic andhealthy living conditions for coastal societies. Neither a purely nominal Mediterranean Unionnor the United Nations' historic and well-meaning, but solely mechanical Blue Plan 32 will besufficient, and the lack of full cooperation between Northern NGOs and North Africancommunities represents a further stumbling block.Without forgetting that it is urgent that we devote every effort to devising and carrying outmitigation proposals (for example for a significant reduction of greenhouse gas emissions inaviation and tourism) and adaptation plans (to protect the most fragile and vulnerableMediterranean communities, especially along the coastal strip of North Africa and Egypt), thevital question should not be "what can we do to stop climate change?" in the region but rather:"How do we want to live here?"The sense of a shared sea was lost duringthe second half of the 20th century, andit has become imperative to restore theidea of the Mediterranean as a sharedliving space. In this unique context,which demands new forms of resistanceand resolution, the priority of social andenvironmental activists should bedemocratic empowerment ofMediterranean societies in terms of:Understanding in detail and in relationto the region as a whole, the nature ofthe climate scenarios that will have adirect effect, in what might be called a campaign for citizen "climate literacy."Strengthening protective measures for the most vulnerable local communities in the mostsensitive areas.Creating mutual support networks for social and institutional initiatives in the North andSouth of the Basin capable of putting projects and emission reduction targets in place andgreening consumption, in order to ensure rapid and free technology transfer of cleantechnologies from the North to the South of the Basin.32www.planbleu.org/indexUK.html55