WTTC to establish global Steering Committee to revive international travel

WTTC takes on global leadership and coordination role to provide a route to recovery

WTTC to establish global Steering Committee to revive international travel

October 19 - The World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) is to spearhead a major global drive to revive international travel with the public and private sector working together in partnership.

Last week, G20 Tourism Ministers hosted more than 45 CEOs and Members of WTTC, who at the request of Saudi Arabia, presented their Jobs Recovery Plan to save the besieged Travel & Tourism sector and 100m jobs globally.

The WTTC Jobs Recovery Plan could save 65 million jobs across all G20 countries, including Spain. Regionally, Asia Pacific could save the most, with 45.8 million jobs, followed by the Americas with 20.2 million and Europe with 19.9 million.

During the historic G20 Tourism Ministers session, WTTC and its Members presented their plan to save the embattled Travel & Tourism sector and explored key initiatives to deliver the prompt recovery of the sector and save millions of lost jobs.

Following its success, WTTC is continuing to lead the response to the devastating challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic to the struggling Travel & Tourism sector.

Now it intends to establish a structure to deliver on these goals, led by a global Steering Committee, comprised of 12 WTTC Member CEOs and other business and institutional leaders to establish an international consensus to take action.

The priorities and recommendations made by the Steering Committee, will be passed onto functional working groups for action and delivery.

These specialized working groups will address how to open up travel by creating crucial ‘air corridors’ and a globally recognized standard for an airport test and trace regime, amongst others.

In addition, a Government Affairs Working Group, will liaise with individual governments to ensure they have all the relevant data and information needed to support our efforts.

WTTC will continue working with major industry bodies and global organisations, such as International Air Transport Association (IATA, International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), Airport Council International (ACI), World Economic Forum (WEF), International Chamber of Commerce (ICC), to further take forward the positive steps which have already been achieved.

WTTC has been at the forefront of leading the private sector in the drive to rebuild international travel.

Its 2020 Economic Impact Report shows how critical the Travel & Tourism sector will be to the economic recovery. During 2019, the report detailed how Travel & Tourism was responsible for one in 10 jobs (330 million in total), making a 10.3% contribution to global GDP and generating one in four of all new jobs.