This is causing massive coral bleaching, alarming volumes of sardines are dying, which are the basis of food for marine fauna (and man), the larger species are going to deeper sites in search of increasingly scarce food. moving away from the reefs that are the source of life in the sea. This is the prelude to a massive extinction of marine bio-mass. What we are experiencing now is a sample of what the climate will be like in 20 or 30 years if we do not take urgent measures to limit the increase in the average temperature of the planet to 1.5ºC, which tragically seems impossible, but to 2ºC, which still seems reachable. Doing nothing puts us in front of a scenario created by ourselves that will generate unimaginable consequences not only for tourism but for us as a species. The pandemic will seem like child’s play.
The good news is that we still have time to generate a change and establish adaptation measures that allow us to live in what will be the new-new-normality.
Every year, in the ATMEX preparation process, we try to address issues that are cutting-edge, current or strategic for the development and strengthening of destinations and operators that are the basis of the economic sector that represents adventure, nature and rural tourism.
This year, we are going to do something slightly different, we are going to focus on what from our point of view is the “super-power” of tourism and the responsibility that we have as an industry to use it to achieve a benefit that transcends our companies, our communities, our destinations and our country.
This super-power is the capacity that we as an industry have to transform consciences.
When we travel, we let our guard downs, we allow ourselves to open our minds to absorb new ideas, new sensations, new ways of seeing the world and interacting with others. Our tourists become sponges seeking information and experiences that allow them to return transformed, strengthened, improved, and with a new connection with themselves and their environment.
As experience designers, we have the privilege of guiding our guests through this process. This transformation is not something that necessarily happens spontaneously or that it occurs in the desired sense. We have the opportunity to induce our travelers, to help them open their eyes and to learn something that, hopefully, will mark them for life in a positive way.
As hosts and managers of the natural environment, which is our raw material for the development of adventure and nature tourism experiences, we have the immense responsibility not only to protect our territory but also to transform consciences to create ambassadors and true agents of change. We need to become the eyes for our visitors through which they can understand the magic that exists out there and fall in love with it as a consequence. “No one protects what they do not love and does not love what they do not know.” Through this change of consciousness we will build armies of believers who can influence, already back in their places of origin, urgently in their homes, in their communities, in their workplaces, towards the change that we must achieve as a species to meet the challenges posed by climate change. I repeat… we are on time.
As an industry we have 1,500 million tourists crossing borders, there are 1,500 million opportunities to generate change.
This year we will hear from some of the best experience designers and builders of stories and narratives under the modality of “storytelling” applied not only to the promotion of our trips, but also to their design. Travel design with conscience that allows us to create unique experiences that transform consciences. Each client that we touch and that we transform will be that sample of our super-power. Let’s use it, and let’s use it now.
