This information is quoted from Green World. The Green World Campaign is adopting new programs from Kenya, Mexico, Ethiopia, India and Philippines read more on the here

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GDP: Direct Contribution
The direct contribution of Travel &Tourism to GDP is expected to be USD629.3bn (2.9% of total GDP) in 2011, rising by 3.9% pa to USD923.9bn (3.1%) in 2021 (in constant 2011 prices).

GDP: Total Contribution
The total contribution of Travel &Tourism to GDP, including its wider economic impacts, is forecast to rise by 3.5% pa from USD1,947.9bn (8.8% of GDP) in 2011 to USD2,762.4bn (9.2%) by 2021.

Employment: Direct Contribution
Travel & Tourism is expected to support directly 15,811,000 jobs (3.8% of total employment) in 2011, rising by 2.0% pa to 19,239,000 jobs (4.0%) by 2021.

Employment: Total Contribution
The total contribution of Travel & Tourism to employment, including jobs indirectly supported by the industry, is forecast to rise by 1.9% pa from 40,738,000 jobs (9.8% of total employment) in 2011 to 49,149,000 jobs (10.2%) by 2021.

Visitor Exports
Travel & Tourism visitor exports are expected to generate USD267.6bn (7.3% of total exports) in 2011, growing by 6.4%pa (in nominal terms) to USD412.7bn (5.5%) in 2021.

Investment
Travel & Tourism investment is estimated at USD207.7bn or 5.4% of total investment in 2011. It should rise by 5.0% pa to reach USD340.2bn (or 5.9%) of total investment in 2021.

The Americas include North America, Caribbean, Central America and South America.

Download the Travel & Tourism report on Americas here

About WTTC
The World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) is the forum for business leaders in the Travel & Tourism industry. With Chief Executives of some one hundred of the world’s leading Travel & Tourism companies as its Members, WTTC has a unique mandate and overview on all matters related to Travel & Tourism.
WTTC works to raise awareness of Travel & Tourism as one of the world’s largest industries, supporting more than 258 million jobs and generating 9.1 per cent of world GDP.

This article is quoted from WTTC . Follow the links and get an overview of 2011 WTTC region reports or country reports.

This article is uploaded by Majbritt Thomsen, administrator on ‘Views On Tourism’. Photo from USA by Runo Magnussen.

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GDP: Direct Contribution
The direct contribution of Travel &Tourism to GDP is expected to be USD492.3bn (2.7% of total GDP) in 2011, rising by 3.7% pa to USD709.1bn (2.9%) in 2021 (in constant 2011 prices).

GDP: Total Contribution
The total contribution of Travel &Tourism to GDP, including its wider economic impacts, is forecast to rise by 3.3% pa from USD1,569.7bn (8.7% of GDP) in 2011 to USD2,179.2bn (9.0%) by 2021.

Employment: Direct Contribution
Travel & Tourism is expected to support directly 9,295,000 jobs (4.6% of total employment) in 2011, rising by 1.5% pa to 10,745,000 jobs (4.7%) by 2021.

Employment: Total Contribution
The total contribution of Travel & Tourism to employment, including jobs indirectly supported by the industry, is forecast to rise by 1.5% pa from 22,619,000 jobs (11.1% of total employment) in 2011 to 26,281,000 jobs (11.5%) by 2021.

Visitor Exports
Travel & Tourism visitor exports are expected to generate USD207.8bn (7.4% of total exports) in 2011, growing by 5.9%pa (in nominal terms) to USD304.1bn (5.1%) in 2021.

Investment
Travel & Tourism investment is estimated at USD155.7bn or 5.1% of total investment in 2011. It should rise by 4.8% pa to reach USD248.5bn (or 5.6%) of total investment in 2021.

World ranking (out of 12 regions):
Relative importance of Travel & Tourism’s total contribution to GDP
• 1 ABSOLUTE size
• 6 RELATIVE contribution to national economy
• 10 GROWTH forecast

North America Region includes Canada, Mexico, USA

Download the Travel & Tourism report on North America here

About WTTC
The World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) is the forum for business leaders in the Travel & Tourism industry. With Chief Executives of some one hundred of the world’s leading Travel & Tourism companies as its Members, WTTC has a unique mandate and overview on all matters related to Travel & Tourism.
WTTC works to raise awareness of Travel & Tourism as one of the world’s largest industries, supporting more than 258 million jobs and generating 9.1 per cent of world GDP.

This article is quoted from WTTC . Follow the links and get an overview of 2011 WTTC region reports or country reports.

This article is uploaded by Majbritt Thomsen, administrator on ‘Views On Tourism’. Photos from USA by Runo Magnussen.

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Around Mexico’s Gulf of California—between Baja California peninsula and the west coast of the mainland—mangroves are being destroyed to make way for high-end tourism resorts, marinas, and controversial industrial shrimp farms.

The government has overvalued such development and grossly undervalued the vital role mangroves play in supporting the region’s U.S. $19-million-dollar fishing industry, the report said.

The Gulf of California harbors more than a hundred fish species, 30 percent of which depend on mangroves for survival.

In particular, the roots of the saltwater forests serve as sanctuaries and nurseries for commercial fish species such as snapper, snook, and mullet.

The study, led by researchers at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego, was published this week in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Money Trees
In the Gulf of California, 2.5 acres (1 hectare) of coastal mangrove helps produce an average of $37,500 worth of harvestable fish and crab species annually, the study said.

Over the productive life of a mangrove forest, more than 30 years, 1 hectare is worth $600,000.

When considering the ecological cost of development, the Mexican National Forest Commission requires developers to pay $1,020 per hectare. Over the course of ten years, this would be 300 times less than what that hectare is actually worth to fisheries, researchers say.

The research is one of the first quantitative analyses of the economic benefits of mangroves to fisheries.

“We can plant mangrove seedlings but we can’t bring back all the biodiversity and ecosystem complexity, and seldom can we bring back all the ecosystem services that they provide,” said Enric Sala, a study co-author and marine ecologist formerly at Scripps and now a National Geographic Visiting Fellow. (National Geographic News is owned by the National Geographic Society.)

Thirteen fishing regions in the gulf produced an average of 11,500 tons of mangrove-derived fish and blue crab a year between 2001 and 2005, generating nearly $19 million for local fishers, the study found.

Worldwide, mangrove benefits have been estimated at $1.68 billion.

“Up to now, mangroves have only been recognized for their aesthetic value for high-end tourism and development,” said Miguel Àngel Vargas of Pronatura Noroeste, the regional arm of the Mexican conservation organization Pronatura.

“Now we know they form the base of the region’s fishing industry as well,” Vargas said.

Acre for Acre
The country’s mangroves, which currently encompass 2.2 million acres (886,760 hectares), are being lost to development at a rate of 25,000 acres (10,000 hectares) annually, according to the environmental group Greenpeace Mexico.

In an attempt to slow the destruction, Mexican President Felipe Calderón approved changes to the national General Wildlife Law in February 2007 that prohibit the “removal, refilling, transplant, pruning, or any project or activity that affects the integrity of the hydrologic flow of the mangrove, of the ecosystem and its zone of influence.”

Conservationists applauded the change. But the country’s powerful tourism industry—which has billions of dollars invested in future resorts sited on or near mangroves—is taking legal action in hopes of being granted exemptions from the law, according to news reports.

The Scripps study has broad implications for coastal conservation policy in Mexico, according to the paper’s authors, who say it will give communities new ammunition to defend their fishing grounds from development.

“So far the fishery sector has not spoken out about the value of the mangroves,” said Octavio Aburto-Oropeza, the study’s lead author and a marine biologist at the Scripps Center for Marine Biodiversity and Conservation in San Diego.

“It’s very important that they come to the discussion table to start saying how important mangroves are for food production and economic benefits for families,” Aburto-Oropeza said.

The authors suggest that if mangroves are to be converted for development, then fishers dependent on the resources should be paid.

Mexico’s National Fisheries and Aquaculture Commission (CONAPESCA) does not offer compensation to communities that lose fishing resources when mangroves are razed.

Ral Villaseor is deputy director of regulations for CONAPESCA.

“CONAPESCA recognizes the environmental services of the mangroves, but it is not able to compensate coastal communities for their protection,” he said, “given that the mangrove is not itself a fishing resource.”

This article is a quoted from National Geographic read the original article written by Eliza Barclay and published July 21, 2008 please follow this link .

This knowledge source was provided by Elisabeth Fahrni Mansur, Training & Education Coordinator at Bangladesh Cetacean Diversity Project/Wildlife Conservation Society.

The article is uploaded by Majbritt Thomsen, administrator on ‘Views On Tourism’

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Mexico City, Mexico- May 8th 2009- Mexico’s President, Felipe Calderon, announced that he will enable extraordinary fiscal and financial measures for the tourism industry with the main objective of accomplishing a fast reactivation for the country’s tourism. In a message to the nation, the President stated that a promotional campaign with the main goal of winning back the trust of international tourists, will soon take effect.

Mexico’s government is working intensely for the return of normalcy in the country and in the hopes that that tourists will soon return to Mexico and take advantage of the country’s beauty and excellent lodging, leisure, entertainment and hospitality that only Mexico can offer.

During a recent press conference, the Secretary of Treasury and Public Credit stated that they will offer fiscal incentives to tourism companies, such as a 50% reduction of costs towards the use of air space and cruise ports for the next three months as well as a discount of 20% in management quotas paid to the Mexican Institute of Social Security (IMSS).

These and other actions form part of the government’s financial stimulus plan which in total add up to 17.4 billion (approximately 1.3 Billion dollars).

The measures taken to prevent the virus from spreading have caused a huge economic impact and are critical to the tourism industry, which is the country’s third source of revenue. Nevertheless, Mexico complied with federal and local sanitary protocols and collectively faced this crisis.

Upon the emergence of this new virus, which had the potential of turning into a pandemic, the Mexican government acted responsibly in respect to the health of its people and in regards to the health of the world’s population; Mexico’s officials had a vision and the strength to carry it out.

The World Health Organization (WHO), along with US President Barack Obama, and Chief of State, Jose Luis Zapatero, have all recognized that it is unfair to accuse Mexico of overreacting and for taking immediate effective actions aligned with international sanitation protocols.

In addition, last Tuesday, Secretary General of the United Nations, Ban Ki-Moon, stated that he would petition governments to annul their commercial and travel bans in place due to the virus outbreak, unless the restrictions were founded on scientific evidence. Dr. David Nabarro, Senior UN Coordinator for Influenza, said countries must explain to WHO their rationale for such measures, and said that their effectiveness is minimal at best. “We want to be very clear that WHO is not recommending travel restrictions related to the outbreak of this novel form of influenza,” said Nabarro. Both dignitaries’ statements are examples of the efforts being made to create unity amidst a global crisis.

Financial Institutions as solid as Grupo Santander, have expressed their optimism towards the adverse situation in Mexico, stating “the Mexican government has acted magnificently in regards to this health crisis,” confirmed President Emilio Botin, “their actions have been phenomenal, very different from past incidents where action was probably not as quick, but in this occasion, fast action was taken with real organized measures and the country will come out of this crisis a lot sooner than expected…the virus will not affect Mexico’s economy in the long-term,” he added.

Speaking about the current international crisis, the banker emphasized that “Mexico’s economy has been coping pretty well during this global crisis and it is much better prepared in comparison to other countries” “We will continue to invest in Mexico,” assured Botin.

About the Mexico Tourism Board
The Mexico Tourism Board (MTB) brings together the resources of federal and state governments, municipalities and private companies to promote Mexico’s tourism attractions and destinations internationally. Created in 1999, the MTB is Mexico’s tourism promotion agency, and its participants include members of both the private and public sectors. The MTB has offices throughout North America, Europe, Japan and Latin America. For more information on destinations and online trip bookings please go to Visit Mexico or Mexico Update.

This article is written by Majbritt Thomsen, administrator on ‘Views On Tourism’.

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