IUCN, the International Union for Conservation of Nature

This joint project between IUCN and Accor, one of the leading hotel companies in the world, focuses on the contribution that hotels can make to conservation and enhancement of biodiversity through their day-to-day operations. Many hotels already make positive contributions to biodiversity in the way they manage their grounds, by obtaining organically-grown food, or by informing their guests about ways they can protect and enjoy biodiversity.

"Biodiversity: My hotel in action" is a guide to sustainable use of biological resources. The Guide focuses in particular on the biodiversity implications of specific products (such as spa products, room amenities, food and drinks, souvenirs, furniture), or activities such as landscaping and ground maintenance, excursions, partnerships and sponsorships with other organizations.

The Guide highlights the different ways in which hotels can influence biodiversity conservation, which include:

• Internal operations (where the hotel has the maximum control)
• The supply chain (how biodiversity issues could be incorporated in purchasing policies)
• Customers (including through awareness raising and information provision)
• Relations with surrounding communities through both partnerships for addressing biodiversity challenges in one or more areas of a hotel’s responsibilities and through cooperation with outside partners and sponsors (traditional philanthropy through donations and support to local organisations and projects).

To ensure that the project draws strongly on Accor’s practical experience, and that the guidelines can be widely adopted and implemented, a ‘focus group’ of Accor hotel manager representatives along with relevant corporate departments has been established and is consulted regularly.

This guide was released during the World Conservation Congress in Barcelona, where Accor also organised a workshop to receive suggestions on how to best disseminate the guide. Click here for the summary of the workshop.

The Guide is published in English.  A French version will be available at the end of 2008.

The project was made possible thanks to the financial contribution of the French Ministry for Ecology, Energy, Sustainable Planning and Development, the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Read the Media Story

Read the workshop summary

IUCN signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the World Economic Forum to become a Data Partner in the development of the 2008 edition of the Travel & Tourism Competitiveness Report, which ranks 130 economies based on a Travel & Tourism Competitiveness Index. BBP coordinated IUCN’s contribution to the development of the environmental and conservation elements of the index for the report, and provided datasets for their implementation. For more information click here.

IUCN joined with the Rainforest Alliance, the United Nations Foundation, United Nations Environment Programme and many other organizations to support the consultation over the draft Sustainable Tourism Baseline Criteria. At the end of 2007, 34 criteria addressing all aspects of sustainability in the tourism industry were developed by the Rainforest Alliance and the UN Foundation.

The aim was to develop generally accepted baseline criteria to enhance the implementation of sustainable tourism principles. These baseline criteria shall be considered the minimum that any tourism business should implement, or that a credible certification programme should be based upon. A further use would be to serve as a framework for developing an accreditation standard for sustainable tourism certification programmes.

The draft baseline criteria are based on many similar sets of principles and guidelines that have been developed since the early 1990s, as well as the standards of over forty sustainable tourism certification programmes.

IUCN’s contribution focused on mobilizing the membership to provide comments and propose changes to the criteria focusing on biodiversity conservation. For more information click here.