It’s more than three months since the World Health Organisation declared the Covid-19 pandemic, and the crisis continues to threaten jobs and livelihoods in tourism and beyond.
The United Nations World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO)is leading a Global Tourism Crisis Committee to agree guidelines to restart tourism, which has garnered support from the United Nations.
UN secretary-general Antonio Guterres has identified the tourism sector as a pillar of economic growth, saying that “tourism can be a platform for overcoming the pandemic”.
Now, the UNWTO Agenda for Africa has been realigned to mitigate the impact of Covid-19 and to accelerate recovery.
The World Committee on Tourism Ethics, an independent body convened by UNWTO, has stressed the importance of safeguarding the Global Code of Ethics for Tourism as travel restrictions are eased, stressing that restarting the sector must be done in a timely and responsible manner, avoiding at all costs coming at the expense of fair and equal treatment of tourists.