Travel and Tourism’s Good, Bad and Ugly Sides


Skift Take

Yes, travel and tourism is a wealth and job creator, but the industry needs to recognize how it plays a central role in some of the world’s biggest problems.

At most corporate conferences, hours blur into days, sessions merge, and speakers all end up sounding identical. You can be anywhere in the world — Africa, Asia, Europe — it doesn’t matter, the conference center renders all cultures the same. It takes something out of the ordinary to really make an impression. At the World Travel and Tourism Council’s Global Summit in Seville, Spain, that came almost at the very end of the two-day event. Fittingly the speaker was sandwiched between the tech boosterism of Hyperloop and Uber in a segment dubbed “Vision of the Future.” It took a while for Chandran Nair, founder and CEO of the Global Institute for Tomorrow, to find his rhythm. He wasn’t as slick and polished as others, and there was