Tenerife - Pioneering Destination in Sustainability
Tenerife, the largest of the Canary Islands with a surface area of more than 2,000 square metres, is one of the pioneering destinations in Spain in terms of sustainability.
Sustainability is, in fact, one of the pillars assessed by the State Enterprise for the Management of Tourism Innovation and Technology (Spanish acronym: SEGITTUR) in the process to grant the island the Smart Tourism Destination stamp in 2020. It is thus fundamental for innovation and technology to work hand-in-hand to make Tenerife a more efficient, accessible and integrating island.
In April 2021, the island was awarded the Biosphere certification – a stamp that emanates from a clear, effective and cross-cutting methodology - which seeks to boost sustainable development actions and programmes. This certification is issued by the Responsible Tourism Institute (RTI), an entity backed by UNESCO and the UN World Tourism Organization, committed to compliance with the Sustainable Development Goals by the year 2030.
The destination’s commitment is based on different work groups, which operate in a cross-cutting fashion to achieve the SDG. To achieve that, the Island Council of Tenerife – the most senior government body on the island – and Turismo de Tenerife – an enterprise attached to the Island Council – work side-by-side on different forums set up to this end. These are all based on another fundamental pillar: governance. The active participation of the whole tourism value chain is necessary to develop towards a model that can count on the involvement of all its constituent parties. This includes society. Accordingly, it is important to include a further concept: tourism democracy. This consists of implementing new tools that allow the whole population to take part in the destination’s tourism policies, such as the recently-created Turismo de Tenerife (TDT) Advisory Council.
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