Hanoi (VNA) – Experts havesuggested Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) members should soonestablish a new cooperation mechanism to develop tourism sustainably.

In 2015, the APEC region welcomed 396million tourists, 33 percent of global holiday-makers. The sector brings inmore than 598 billion USD, making up 44.5 percent of global turnover.

In the Macao Declaration issued in2014, APEC tourism ministers set a target of attracting 800 millioninternational visitors by 2025. If the target is reached, it will add 3.8trillion USD to the region’s gross domestic product (GDP), create an additional21.1 million jobs and help 15.2 million people escape from poverty.

To fulfill the objective, APECmembers sought to chart development plans for a tourism-based economy at theninth APEC Tourism Ministerial Meeting in Lima, Peru, in May 2016.

They plan to focus on enhancingconnectivity between domestic and international airlines, implementing measuresdesigned specifically to facilitate tourism and organising training programmes toimprove capacity of tourism workers, businesspeople and small-scale travelfirms.

During the 49th meeting ofthe APEC Tourism Working Group (TWG) in Papua New Guinea in 2016, APECofficials and their partners discussed regional cooperation in tourism.

Rapid tourism development is forecastedto negatively impact the environment and climate. Therefore, sustainable tourismis an important goal for the world and the APEC economies in particular.

In 2014, the TWG announced a report onsustainable tourism and instructions on building sustainable tourism sites.

Representativesfrom 21 APEC economies adopted a statement on sustainable tourism developmentduring the APEC High Level Policy Dialogue on Sustainable Tourism held inVietnam’s northeastern province of Quang Ninh on June 19 this year.

Thestatement delivers a message of supporting principles and actions to promotesustainable tourism, with sustainable tourism regarded as a continuous processthat requires constant impact monitoring.

Thedocument also underlines the need to foster regional and domestic tourismpolicies that support the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals and encourageviable, long-term economic contributions from travel and tourism in providing benefitsfor all stakeholders.

Itmentions the respect for socio-cultural authenticity of host communities and encouragingconsumer-led demand for sustainable tourism practices and products, promotingpublic-private partnership to develop sustainable tourism infrastructure andservices, creating competitive and enabling environments for alltourism-related enterprises and conducting studies to enable APEC economies toadapt to, and capitalise on, changes made by new technology.

VietnameseDeputy Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism Huynh Vinh Ai told reportersfollowing the dialogue that representatives of the APEC economies agreed thatsustainable tourism serves as a driving force for regional economic integrationas well as comprehensive and sustainable economic growth.

Apartfrom the environment and climate, sustainable tourism should be related to thematerial and spiritual life of communities, as well as local traditionalcultural values, ecological systems and natural heritage, he said.

Headded that the APEC members committed to put forth effective policies to spursustainable tourism development based on the situation in each country, withattention paid to community-based tourism.

Experts,however, suggested promptly building a mechanism to boost links between theAPEC members to cope with challenges facing by the tourism sector, includingclimate change and sustainable development.-VNA