Welcome to the United Nations
UNWTO on the thematic review of the HLPF 2022
Requested by His Excellency Mr. Collen Vixen Kelapile, President of the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) vis-à-vis
Office of Intergovernmental Support and Coordination for Sustainable Development (OISC) - Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA)
The World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) is the United Nations (UN) Specialized agency responsible for the promotion of responsible, sustainable and universally accessible tourism.
In view of the forthcoming 2022 HLPF (High-level Political Forum on Sustainable Development) on the theme Building back better from the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) while advancing the full implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, which will include a review of the “progress toward SDG 4 on quality education, SDG 5 on gender equality, SDG 14 on life below water, SDG 15 on life on land, and SDG 17 on partnerships for the Goals”, UNWTO submits the current note as its contribution to the process.
SDG 4 on quality education:
It is evident that digital transformation has advanced during the pandemic and so has online education, which will help the tourism sector to provide more opportunities to communities all over the world.
Despite representing 10% of the world’s jobs before COVID-19, and employing the largest number of women, tourism has faced a challenge in terms of skills development. Indeed, almost 20% of the employed people in selected tourism industries in the European Union had less than primary and lower secondary education in 2018. Furthermore, currently there is no continuous measurement or updated data on skills development and its contribution to creating added value jobs.
A lower level of salaries in comparison to other economic sectors put in evidence the need to provide more education opportunities and the creation of a professional path for the sector, which means to put tourism in curricula as a vital sector for global economy and to allow employees to scale up their careers in the several subsectors.
In this regard, UNWTO encourages to increase democratization of online education through high-quality and affordable programmes and a scheme of scholarships worldwide. For this reason, it has strengthened its UNWTO Tourism Online Academy as a platform, including its developed knowledge, material and content with the courses, that is aimed at leaving no one behind.
SDG 5 on gender equality:
Tourism has historically been a leading sector in the achievement of SDG 5, providing opportunities for women’s economic empowerment, leadership and educational possibilities. The devastating impact of COVID-19 on tourism however, has been felt disproportionately by women in the sector. The preliminary findings of UNWTO research indicate that more women than men in tourism saw their earnings decrease or lost their jobs during the pandemic, stalling progress towards SDG 5 and exacerbating existing gender inequalities.
As the sector recovers, UNWTO strongly recommends that governments develop gender-responsive recovery policies for a post-COVID19 tourism in order to harness the sector’s huge empowering potential for women. Policies should be adopted with a view to promoting decent employment for women in tourism, ensuring opportunities for entrepreneurship are equally accessible, developing diverse skills for a post-COVID19 tourism and increasing the production and reporting of sex-disaggregated tourism data.
Implementing recovery plans and policies that are gender-responsive would allow governments and businesses to advance progress towards the objectives of SDG 5, using tourism’s restart to make up for the increase in gender inequalities observed during the COVID-19 pandemic.
