Initiatives of Association of Greek Tourism Enterprises (SETE) and the Hellenic Chamber of Hotels (HCL) are expected in the next period with the aim of defining a framework for the “sustainable development” of Greek tourism. SETE has already announced a pilot initiative in this direction, METRON Sustainable Tourism by SETE, while the Hellenic Chamber of Hotels is also preparing a sustainable development initiative of a horizontal nature. The two agencies should cooperate in this sense, in collaboration with the Ministry of Tourism, as mentioned by the president of SETE. Giannis Paraschis.
The question is that of initiatives to include sustainability in its development strategy tourism sector concern all businesses and “leave no one behind”.
Hospitality and sustainable development
The big concern is the thousands of small and medium-sized Greek tourism businesses that generally do not have the financial capacity to implement sustainable development measures. The lack of sustainability, SETE reports, is particularly pronounced in small and medium-sized businesses with a turnover of less than €10 million, which make up the majority of the sector.
The % of all hotels have or intend to adopt sustainable practices.
However, there are also 22% of hospitality businesses that do not have or do not intend to implement sustainable practices and the main reason (69.5%) is lack of financing.
According to the ITEP survey, the main factor holding back investments in sustainable development for 60% of hoteliers is the high cost of investment. Only 6% of hotels have benefited from financial programs linked to sustainable development in the past. Hoteliers would be willing if there were appropriate funding programs for sustainability.
However, according to the same continuous ITEP survey, the vast majority of respondents (87%) consider that the adoption of sustainable practices is important for the future of their hotel business.
Regardless, as SETE President Yiannis Paraschis pointed out at the recent SETE General Assembly, “the creation of a sustainable and environmentally friendly tourism business is the only way if we want Greek tourism to continue its positive journey and for Greece to score to stay at the top.”
In this context, SETE announced an important initiative for the transition of tourism businesses towards sustainability.
He named it METRON Sustainable Tourism by SETE: “Because METRON means measure, proportion and also rule. Because sustainability without measurement, without rules, cannot exist. »
As described by Mr. Paraschis, the initiative concerns an integrated program of self-assessment, monitoring, training, compliance, self-engagement and targeting, reassessment and certification of companies.
The initiative starts in the second half of 2024 with the pilot application in selected companies before the deployment of the program based on an electronic platform and aims – initially – to measure five key indicators: energy consumption, water consumption , production and waste management, work. Issues, social footprint in the sectors: Hospitality, Air transport, Maritime transport, Land transport, Tourist offices And of course, as Mr. Paraschis pointed out, “we are in discussions with the Ministry of Tourism and the XEE, to maximize synergies for the benefit of tourism businesses.”