The three different approaches the World Tourism Organization is taking and the resolutions passed
Throughout all four of their committee sessions, the World Tourism Organization (WTO) has discussed the best way to protect the precious biodiversity in tourist-heavy nations.
It has resulted in three different, but similar resolutions on how to tackle the problem.
One resolution had four major points that comprised the majority of their ideas.
“One thing we want to accomplish is educating the tourists on preserving biodiversity. We want to raise public awareness so that people are aware that the ecosystem is an important aspect of their country,” said the delegate of Qatar.
He then went on to state that the resolution also wants to increase research on endangered species, reduce poaching and endorse ecotourism.
To accomplish all this, the Qatari delegate said that they “want to work with pre-existing non-governmental organizations (NGO) to achieve our goals.” However, he would go on to say that if necessary, they would be willing to allocate funds towards the creation of new NGOs if it helps apply their resolution to the tourism industry.
In contrast, there were two other resolutions that focused more on the economic side of biodiversity.
“Lessening the amount of influence larger nations have economically in the tourism industry is our goal,” said the delegate from Morocco. “We want transparency on the preservation of biodiversity from all nations.”
The delegate says that lesser-developed nations are in need of financial assistance, so he and his fellow delegates call for tax breaks for the financially vulnerable nations. “Tax breaks will allow lesser-developed nations to receive the financial incentive for their economy to be successful,” said the Moroccan delegate.
The third resolution was extremely similar to the aforementioned one.
“We hope that economic incentives like tariff and tax cuts, can help aid the smaller nations,” said the Costa Rican delegate, an almost identical approach as the second resolution.
However, they want to give more control to indigenous populations, because they believe that “if they lead the forefront and continue their practices, they will be extremely effective in protecting the biodiversity of their nation,” said the delegate of Costa Rica.
Now of course, there has been some criticism about the tariff breaks by some of the larger nations.
“Some countries, those with large oil and grain exports, criticized our resolution. They were concerned that this would financially hurt the global economy, especially those that import and export frequently,” said the Costa Rican delegate.
However, they reminded those concerned that the delegates want people to know that “some of these countries economically rely on the beauty of biodiversity for their economy. It’s vital that we protect our ecosystems, not only for the global economy, but for our planet’s wellbeing as well.”
This sentiment was felt among the majority of the committee, as all three resolutions would be past circa 2:45 P.M. during the fourth committee session.
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