Sunday, November 30, 2008

Environment and Tourism leaders bond


At UN World Tourism Day celebrations in Lima Peru; tourism leaders and leaders of the environmental movement in the Amazon region, were engaged in a ‘Think Thank’ - brain storming session themed 'Tourism: Responding to the Challenge of Climate Change', where Sri Lanka Tourism’s, ‘Towards a Carbon Clean Sri Lanka, was the curtain raiser presentation. Recognized by the UNWTO as a pioneering initiative in tourism, the Amazon states were exposed to the potential for tourism to be catalytic to reduce travel guilt through CO2 reduction efforts at destinations.

The Think Tank exponents included Antonio Brack Egg, Minister of Environment of Peru & well known environmental activist; Taleb Rifai, Deputy Secretary General of UNWTO; Mercedes Araoz, Minister of Tourism and Foreign Trade of Peru; Ricardo Sanchez Sosa, Regional Director for Latin America and the Caribbean of UNEP; Donald Sinclair, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism Coordinator of ACTO, Brazil; Valleria Pellizza, National Director of Tourism Development, Argentina; Ester Trujillo, Vice President, Sustainable Development of Sol Melia in Spain; Dr. David de Villiers, Chairman of the World Committee on Tourism Ethics; Kofi Owsei-Ameyaw, Deputy Minister of Tourism of Ghana and Geoffrey Lipman, Assistant Secretary General of the UNWTO.

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