Launch of IIPT’s 30th anniversary year

IIPT Launches 30th Anniversary Year at

World Travel Market Special Event The International Institute for Peace through Tourism (IIPT) launched the 30th anniversary of its birth this past month at a World Travel Market Special event. IIPT was born in 1986, the UN International Year of Peace with a vision of travel and tourism becoming the world’s first “global peace industry” and the belief that every traveler is potentially an “Ambassador for Peace.”

Theme of the Platinum Suite event at World Travel Market was, “From Conflict to Sustainable Tourism: the Northern Ireland Experience” highlighting the experience of Northern Ireland in its transformation from a nation of conflict to sustainable tourism development with its related socio-cultural, economic and political benefits.

Ms. Anita Mendiratta moderating panel with panel members from left to right:

Mayor Eneko Goia, Mr. Hiran Cooray, H.E. Akel Biltaji and Ms. Suzanne Wiley.

Dr. Taleb Rifai, Secretary General, U.N. World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) opened the session with his insights from a global perspective followed by Ms. Suzanne Wylie, CEO Belfast City Counci; H.E. Akel Biltaji, Mayor of Amman and former Minister of Tourism and Antiquities, Jordan; Mr. Hiran Cooray, Director – Sri Lanka Tourism Development Authority, Chairman, Jetwing Hotels Ltd, and Past Chairman, Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA); and Mr. Eneko Goia, Mayor of San Sebastian, Spain. Ms. Anita Mendiratta was Master of Ceremony of the event and Panel Moderator.

Dr. Rifai spoke of the longstanding and fruitful relationship between UNWTO and IIPT bound by the same values and belief that tourism can be an instrument of peace and sustainable development. “With over one billion tourists crossing international borders every year, our sector has become a dynamic vehicle for developing the global economy and improving livelihoods by creating jobs, reducing inequality and increasing political stability.”

“Most importantly, every single one of these tourists has the potential to be a global ambassador for peace and sustainable development for behind tourism’s big numbers is something infinitely more profound – a daily exchange of stories, experiences and perspectives that defies any difference in background or culture.”

Suzanne Wylie spoke of the Belfast tourism success story stating that “Our visitors are telling us they are motivated to visit Belfast because of its ‘journey to peace.’ There is a real curiosity when visitors arrive to understand the ‘authentic’ and ‘human’ story behind the media headlines.”

Belfast’s murals are a unique piece of living political, social and cultural history together with The International Peace Wall and Black Taxi tours. The special role the black taxis played during the Troubles is a central part of the tour story. That locals could hail, share and trust taxis in Belfast during the conflict is fascinating to learn, and gives tourists a sense of participating in a real-life social phenomenon.”

“There are a number of museums and libraries in the city telling part of the story and beyond the traditional visitor interfaces there are a number of sites which give the visitor an opportunity to better understand this turbulent part of our history. Belfast is at an electrifying turning point. After decades of troubles, the city is oozing energy, creativity and a can-do attitude. As a city we have thankfully emerged from a very damaging conflict and we are now attracting significant numbers of international visitors, many of whom are interested in the ‘beyond peace’ element of our story.”

H.E. Akel Biltaji, Hiran Cooray and Mayor Eneko Goia similarly spoke of the respective experiences of Amman, Sri Lanka and San Sebastian. A reception sponsored by School of Management/Ysgol Reolaeth, Swansea University, Wales in conjunction with Wales for Peace followed the event with Professor Terry Stevens as Master of Ceremony.

H.E. Akel Biltaji

Mr. Hiran Corray

Mayor Eneko Goia

Ms. Anita Mendiratta

Prof. Terry Stevens

IIPT President Featured Speaker

at Sustainable Tourism + 20 Summit

IIPT Founder and President, Dr. Louis D’Amore was a featured speaker at the recently held Sustainable Tourism + 20 Summit held recently in Vitoria-Gasteiz, Basque Country (Spain), on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the Charter for Sustainable Tourism. The Sustainable Tourism +20 Summit was organized by the Responsible Tourism Institute (RTI), the Global Sustainable Tourism Council (GSTC) and the Basque Tourism Agency, with the support of UNESCO, UNWTO and the main international organizations working in sustainable tourism.

Dr. D’Amore’s talk emphasized four key challenges to sustainable tourism development in the next twenty years.

Limits to Growth
As early as 1972, the milestone Club of Rome report – “Limits to Growth” warned leaders of the world that “if present growth trends in world population, industrialization, pollution, food production, and resource depletion continue unchanged, the limits to growth on this finite planet will be reached sometime in the next 100 years.”

A 20 year update of the study in 1992 “Beyond the Limits” concluded that humanity had already overshot the limits of the earth’s supporting capacity.

The World Wildlife Fund estimates that we currently require the equivalent of 1 ½ planets to sustain ourselves – and if current trends continue – even two planets will not be enough by the 2030’s. The Global Footprint Network has stated that “Overshoot Day” for 2015 was 13 August – this is the day when humanity has used up the renewable resources that it takes the planet a full year to regenerate. The first earth overshoot day was December 23, 1970.

A further examination of humanity’s ecological footprint suggests that the very areas where the greatest growth in international tourism arrivals are projected, are areas most seriously exceeding their ecological capacity.

Climate Change
Perhaps the most serious and immediate threat to the future of sustainable tourism development is climate change. Carbon pollution has now reached a historic high with concentrations in the atmosphere of 400 parts per million (ppm) from a base line of 280 ppm at the start of industrialization. Half of that increase has occurred since 1980. The upper safety limit for atmospheric CO2 is 350 parts per million (ppm).

Global Income Inequality
Global income inequality has been described as “one of the key challenges of our time” and is affecting countries around the world – developed and developing countries alike. World Bank President, Jim Yong Kim, has declared that extreme income inequality is a disincentive to efforts at reducing extreme poverty globally, pointing out that a billion of the world’s population live in extreme poverty. The recipe for bringing an end to poverty globally, was to make growth more inclusive and not merely focusing on economic growth.

Growing Threat of Terrorism
Finally, the continuing and growing threat of terrorism has a serious impact on international tourism, particularly as it is frequently aimed at tourism as we saw recently in Sharm el Sheikh, and Tunisia – and major sporting and entertainment events as in Paris.

Conclusion
With 2017 having just been declared the UN International Year of Sustainable Tourism for Development, the industry has an excellent opportunity to marshall a major collaborative effort to address these challenges. For its part, IIPT will dedícate 2016, its 30th anniversary year, to promoting and gaining support towards a mobilization of the industry for this purpose as well as its visión of travel and tourism becoming the world’s first global peace industry – and its belief that every traveler is potentially an “Ambassador for Peace.”

Growing the IIPT Family

The Sustainable Tourism + 20 Summit also provided an excellent opportunity for networking and growing the “IIPT Family.” Here, Louis D’Amore is pictured with two new Members of the IIPT Family, Imaculada Climent Liuch and Jordi Lopez Roig, Co-founders of I Travel Eco.

Cassie Continues Inspirational Journey as

IIPT Ambassador for Peace.

“Our generation, ‘The Millennials’, have a unique opportunity to change the world with the internet and instant communication which has no borders. We are connected and my journey is showing that connection. Millennials can unite the world.” Cassandra De Pecol ,IIPT Ambassador for Peace.

Cassie continues her record breaking journey to all 196 sovereign nations as IIPT Ambassador for Peace. She has now visited 51 countries. The goal of Expedition 196 promoting Peace through Tourism is to unearth the beauty of every nation and its people – and to share this with the world.

Visiting each nation as an Ambassador of the International Institute for Peace through Tourism (IIPT) and Skal International (the world’s largest organization of travel and tourism professionals), Cassie will be planting a tree and collecting water samples for an Adventurers and Scientists for Conservation project.

Skal International President, Nigel Pilkington has been arranging for Skal national Presidents to meet Cassie on arrival in their respective countries, and to arrange meetings with Mayors and other community leaders and also for Cassie to address groups of college and high school students.

During her journey Cassie hopes to demonstrate that her generation can create positive, peaceful relations with all countries, in part through sustainable tourism, which brings cultures together and makes a positive impact on the environment, society and the economy.

Skal International President,
Nigel Pilkington and Cassie “Tourism is one of the only industries in the world that has seen constant growth over the past 65 years with over 1 billion people traveling in 2014”, stated Cassie in an interview during her visit to Norway. “By traveling and meeting others and being accepting of different cultures, traditions and beliefs we can break down the barriers of mistrust and suspicion and really start a drive to a peaceful and more humane world where people just simply enjoy and embrace the differences amongst us”, she added.

When Cassie meets with students in different countries, she tries to emphasize how they can promote friendship and understanding when they travel abroad, or to different places within their own country.

As Expedition 196 gains more publicity and more people follow Cassie’s global journey, she hopes to show we can unite the world by interacting with other cultures and peoples.

“My dream is to inspire millennials to lead the life they want for themselves and others.” Find Cassie De Pecol at http://www.expedition196.com

IIPT Founder and President to Serve as International Honorary Chair for Upcoming African Diaspora World Tourism Awards Ceremony

IIPT Founder and President, Dr. Louis D’Amore will serve as an International Honorary Chair of the African Diaspora World Awards (ADWT-Awards) Ceremony set to take place April 15-17, 2016 in Atlanta, Ga. USA. He is joining several other top tourism professionals from around the world who have endorsed the awards event with a show of support by serving as chair. Through D’Amore, IIPT will help as a strategic partner in presenting the ADWT-Awards event.

Dr. D’Amore stated “IIPT is proud to be a strategic partner in the Africa Diaspora World Tourism Awards (ADWT Awards). As an Honorary Chair, I will fully support our good friend and colleague, Kitty Pope in again achieving the highly successful outcomes realized in the historic inaugural ADWT Awards.”

Other stellar leaders serving as an International Honorary Chair include: 1) Dr. Ewart Brown, the former Premier of Bermuda who was the recipient of the inaugural ADWT-Awards Person of the Year for his leadership in igniting the concept of African Diaspora Heritage Trails as a tourism product; 2) Mother Queen Best K. Olimi, the Mother Queen of the Tooro Kingdom of Uganda who is a founding leader and the current Continental President of The African Queen and Women Cultural Leaders Network; 3) Senator Princess Florence Ita-Giwa, a Nigerian princess who served as a senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria in 1992 until 2003 4) Dr. David Fleming of the United Kingdom, who has served as Director of National Museums Liverpool since 2001 where he has overseen visitation quadruple from around 700,000 per year to now more than 3.2 million per year.

Also, returning as a chair for the African Diaspora World Tourism Awards are Naomi King and Joe Beasley. Naomi King is the sister-in-law of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr and the co-founder of the AD King Foundation that honors the legacy of her husband Rev. A.D. King, the brother of the late Dr. King’s brother. Joe Beasley is an international humanitarian and founder of the Joe Beasley Foundation that serves to promote social equality around the world.

The ADWT-Awards event will again be presented by African Diaspora Tourism with publisher Kitty J. Pope who is the founder/director and executive producer of the event. Helping to present the event is the AD King Foundation CEO Dr. Babs Onabanjo who is the ADWT-Awards producer. Also helping as a producer is Africa’s tourism guru Ikechi Uko, a foremost travel branding expert from Nigeria who will present an African Tourism component, and socio-economic developer Rev. Eugene Franklin, founder of the Pan African Cultural Heritage Initiative who will present a Pan African Tourism component for the ADWT-Awards event.

Like the previous one, this awards event week-end will include the awards Gala, cultural entertainment, a Hall of Fame Luncheon and a Travel Expo. The ADWT-Awards event will feature two new components where event attendees can learn various aspects about African Tourism as well as Diaspora Tourism. The two new components are: 1) Bantaba: Africa Comes to her Diaspora and 2) The Green Book Summit: The Pan African Cultural Heritage Tourism Roundtable. In addition to having seminars and informative meetings, Bantaba and the Green Book Summit will be a part of the Travel Expo. These two new additions to the ADWT-Awards and Travel Expo guarantee something for everyone interested in cultural heritage tourism.

The Master and Mistress of the Ceremony will be internationally acclaimed film, television and stage actor Afemo Omilami and founder of the globally renown Nomadness Travel Tribe Evita Robinson. Omilami has been in show business for almost 35 years where he is best known for his roles in legendary films such as The Hunger Games, Catching Fire, Forrest Gump, Drumline, and The Blind Side. Robinson launched Nomadness Travel Tribe as an urban travel organization that has now turned into a full-fledged travel movement that now has a membership base of about 10,000 people in over three dozen countries.

Dr. Ewart Brown	Joe Beasley	Ms. Naomi King

Dr. David Fleming	Queen Best K. Olimi	Princess Florence Ita Giwa

Dr. Babs Onabanjo	Rev. Eugene Franklin	Ikechi Uko

For more information about the 2016 African Diaspora World Tourism Awards event, please contact Kitty J. Pope at Kpope. Registration to attend opens in January.

IIPT Caribbean President Receives

Entrepreneurship Award

Diana McIntyre Pike, President, IIPT Caribbean and Founder/President Countrystyle Community Tourism Network is one of 200 grassroots and microbusiness women given the Manchester Business Women Entrepreneurship Award. The award was presented

during Global Entrepreneurship Week(November 16 – 22, 2015) and the closing Parish of Manchester’s 200th anniversary.

Diana receiving award

The champions were honoured for their commitment and perseverance in difficult times in their bid to keep their business afloat and provide for their families. The Awards event was organized by Ms. Annette Salmon, Principal Marketing Consultant, Twenty Strategies Consulting, Mandeville Manchester.

For more information:
IIPT Website: www.iipt.org
Tel: (802) 253-8671
Fax: (802) 253-2645
Email: ljd