The Role of Sustainable Tourism in Furthering USAID’s Mission

Over forty years ago, USAID was established to address the issues of economic growth, poverty reduction, health and humanitarian assistance.
The challenges remain massive and stubborn. Whether because of weak governance and poor policies, human rights abuses and social inequities, armed conflict and natural disasters, catastrophic health and environmental calamities, one-sixth of the world’s population – mostly women and children – suffer from hunger and malnutrition.

USAID recognizes that sustainable tourism is playing an ever-increasing role in the international development arena, helping to meet diverse objectives such as economic growth, poverty alleviation, improved local governance, biodiversity conservation, and enhanced management of natural resources Tourism is a particularly powerful tool for achieving our goals because it has become one of the largest – if not the largest – single industries in the world. It has grown rapidly and almost continuously over the last 20 years, and the World Tourism Organization reports it to be one of the world’s most important sources of employment and of Gross Domestic Product.

This article is quoted from Tourism ROY Newsletter published on 2010-02-02. Follow this link to read the article . Download the full report The Role of Sustainable Tourism in Furthering USAID’s Mission (October 19th, 2004).