The Practice of Sustainability: Beyond Educational Boundaries

Sustainability is living within the limits of available physical, natural, and social resources in ways that allow the living systems in which humans are embedded to thrive in perpetuity.

I've been teaching sustainable tourism and sustainable hotel operations at our local college for the past three years. The students are highly engaged, as the younger generation fully aligns with sustainable initiatives and business practices, ensuring they live a sustainable lifestyle. When I teach these classes, there is a relevance to each lecture, and there is a high level of engagement from the students. This is a topic that is at the top of everyone's mind. They understand the impact that they have on the world, and they want to strive to make it a better place in which to learn, work, and live.

When it comes to the hotel and travel industry, sustainability is at the forefront of our industry, and yes, it is imperative that hotel and travel companies fall in line as quickly as possible. Several programs within the hotel and travel industry are focused on sustainability in Europe, Asia, and the Americas, and these associations/certification bodies offer guidance to hotels and travel companies. Still, they tend to fall short when it comes to execution. Hotel and travel companies need to focus on implementing programs and procedures to ensure that they deliver on supporting sustainability initiatives. Signing up for these associations and programs is great, but delivering is another story.

Booking.com came out with a report in October of 2023 and this report was focused on sustainability and its importance to the traveling public. 78% of the people queried stated that they want to travel more sustainably and ensure that the experiences that they crave are also sustainable. 43% of those queried stated that they would be willing to pay more for a hotel room located on a property with a sustainability certification process or working towards one. Then why do so many hotel companies bury their sustainability mandates and programs well below the fold on their respective websites? When a sustainable-conscious traveler pulls up a Marriott website, there needs to be a reference on its landing page stating that they focus on sustainability. The same is true of Hilton, Hyatt, IHG hotels, and so many more. This appears to be counterproductive when guests have indicated that they are willing to increase their spend when it comes to sustainable hotels.

So once again, I ask, if 43% of people surveyed through a Booking.com sustainability report stated that they're willing to pay more for a hotel that shows that it offers a sustainable solution, why are these hotel companies so reticent to state that sustainability is a paramount concern of theirs, and thus it is part of the navigation bar when you land on these specific websites?

When one hears the word sustainability in concert with the travel, tourism, and hospitality industry, one immediately thinks of the environmental impacts facing our world. However sustainability is so much more than that. Not only is it environmental, but we also need to focus on economic sustainability as well as social sustainability. The United Nations put together what are called its Sustainable Development Goals many years ago. Still, a vast number of those goals focus on equity, equality, life, and healthcare, to name a few, above and beyond the environmental side of the goals. 11 fully understands how important sustainability is to every aspect of our lives; it then becomes more important not only to individuals but it must become important to corporations, especially those within the travel, tourism, and hospitality industry

Social sustainability does not receive enough recognition when it comes to the overall goals of sustainability. We need to ensure the fact that as an industry, we not only focus on the environment but we focus on people. We also need to ensure that we focus on less fortunate people. We must ensure they have affordable housing and healthcare, food security, the ability to earn a living wage, safety in the workplace and within their communities, and cooperation and interaction with businesses. Last but not least, we all must respect and preserve each other's cultures and traditions.

I believe that everyone reading this article fully understands that sustainability needs to be a top priority for everyone; however, we don't seem to be able to get ramped up to tackle the issues of sustainability. Why is this? Because it's hard. Implementing a sustainability process, its programs, and associated technologies is heavy lifting. It's time-consuming and challenging for everyone involved. But these challenges need to be met head-on, and we need to get on board to ensure that the younger generations have a full and prosperous life.

While the future of the sustainable tourism sector has many challenges, including carrying capacities, environmental fragility and limitations, and climate change, the sector itself is ripe with opportunities for growth. The hotel industry is also ripe for the marketing departments of hotel companies, both large and small, to leverage their sustainability efforts to help educate their respective travelers. They need to be educated on what they should do to make the world a better place and where they should spend their hard-earned money with companies with the same sustainable mindset.