Destinations

We know that the leisure travel industry can have both positive and negative impacts on communities and the natural environment, depending on how these impacts are managed. We are committed to learning more about how our holidays can benefit local livelihoods and protect the environment – and putting these insights into practice. This is fundamental to preserving the quality of our product in years to come.

TUI Travel has an extensive supply chain operating across the globe, made up of many different kinds of tour operator and owner of accommodation, both large and small. These businesses are the gatekeepers to TUI Travel’s sustainability performance in our destinations, as each of them plays a significant role in managing our impacts on the local community, economy and environment. By focusing on sustainability, our suppliers are able to achieve cost efficiency savings which ultimately give customers better value for money. Our challenge is to extend the reach of our influence to all suppliers and to monitor their progress.

This year we can report:

• 77% of our businesses are actively engaging with suppliers on environmental issuesⁱⁱ
• We rolled out environmental and social contractual standards for accommodation suppliers
• 49% of our businesses have adopted the Travelife Sustainability Systemⁱⁱ www.its4travel.com, an industry tool used to audit and support tourism businesses on social and environmental criteria and highlight best performers to our customers
• 94% of businesses support environmental and social projects in destinationsⁱⁱ
• We initiated a project to measure the socio-economic impact of an all-inclusive hotel property in Turkey. In 2009/10 the key findings will be published and recommendations implemented.

Our two workstreams are Supplier Management and Destination Projects.

Supplier Management Goal: Ensure all suppliers in our destinations follow sustainability policies and have continuous improvement programmes in place.

Destination Project Goal: TUI Travel, working with partners, will make measurable improvements to local livelihoods and environmental protection in our destinations.

Board sponsor: Dermot Blastland, Managing Director, TUI UK & Ireland.

"77% of our businesses are actively engaging with suppliers on environmental issuesⁱⁱ"

Supplier standards
Our principal suppliers are hotel owners & operators and transport & excursion providers. Our UK and destination teams undertake regular inspections of accommodation, transport and excursion suppliers to assess not just health and safety, but also quality and sustainability. We work with our suppliers on a cycle of continuous improvement. If suppliers fall below our expectations, we remove them from our programmes. In addition to health and safety standards the Travelife Sustainability System www.its4travel.com has been adopted by a number of businesses in the Mainstream Sector and in the Specialist & Emerging Markets Sector. TUI Travel completed more than 400 Travelife hotel sustainability audits during 2009 and by the end of this period 132 hotels had received Travelife awards. TUI Western Europe launched a website for suppliers to encourage support for the Travelife Sustainability System www.tuigreen.com. Over the next year our other mainstream tour operating businesses will progressively adopt the Travelife Sustainability System.

TUI Central Europe is continuing with its well recognised TUI Umwelt Champion (’Environment Champion’) award for its 100 most environmentally friendly hotels www.tui-deutschland.de/umwelt and TUI Nordic is working to achieve ISO14001 certification in all Blue Village flagship properties in Europe and Turkey by the end of 2010 www.fritidsresor.se.

We are working particularly closely with our flagship hotel suppliers to drive cutting edge sustainability performance, going beyond best practice benchmarks. In 2008/09, TUI UK & Ireland appointed an environmental management professional to carry out Environmental Diagnostic Audits for hotel properties in Turkey, Greece, Egypt and Spain. As an example of industry leading practice, First Choice Holiday Village Cyprus uses an average of 178 litres per guest per night and 17.2 kWh of energy.

Environmental and social contractual standards
This year our Mainstream Sector Northern Region and Specialist & Emerging Markets Sector introduced environmental and social contractual standards for accommodation suppliers. The contractual standards require each hotelier to initiate (or continue to develop) a sustainability programme, managing their impacts on the environment, their employees and the local community. Over the course of the next financial year, these environmental and social contractual standards will be embedded into the accommodation contracting processes of all our mainstream tour operating businesses.

Animal welfare
We experience high demand amongst our customers for visits to captive animal attractions whilst on holiday. The issues of animals in captivity is a sensitive one for our customers as well as for our Company. Our objective is to encourage suppliers to achieve best practice in animal welfare in the captive and non-captive animal attractions to which we facilitate visits for our customers. This year, we developed a Groupwide policy on animal welfare, our 95 destination supplier auditors received training from the Born Free Foundation www.bornfree.org.uk on this issue, and our regular quality checks now include key animal welfare criteria for animal attractions. In 2009/10 we are implementing a Travelife audit programme for all major animal attraction excursion venues used across the Group. TUI Travel is also an active member of the ABTA Animal Welfare Committee, working collaboratively with industry peers to improve animal welfare standards.

"We have rolled out environmental and social contractual standards for accommodation suppliers"

Destination initiatives
Across the Group, we communicate opportunities for our businesses to support destination projects. In 2008/09, 94% of businesses supported environmental and social projects in destinationsⁱⁱ and 81% of our businesses have destination initiatives which they consider benefit local livelihoodsⁱⁱ, many of which are in collaboration with The Travel Foundation www.thetravelfoundation.org.uk. In January 2009, TUI Central Europe launched Futouris, a new initiative that aims to use the resources of several tour operators in the region. The initiative will promote projects for improving living conditions, supporting education, protecting nature and the environment, and preserving biodiversity www.futouris.org. In October 2009, TUI Deutschland started to plant a forest in the Llevante nature reserve, in eastern Majorca. 57,600 wild olive and pine trees will be planted over a number of years on a 48-hectare site, to stop the continuing ground erosion of the coastal slopes and to raise awareness of environmental issues among customers.

Measuring our socio-economic impacts
We have initiated a project, together with the Overseas Development Institute and the Travel Foundation, to gain a better understanding of the socio-economic impacts of our operations in developing destinations, particularly in relation to the growing all-inclusive holiday market. The project measured the  linkages  between  a  large all-inclusive hotel (First Choice Holiday Village Turkey) and  the  local  economy  and  proposed interventions  to strengthen  these  links. We are working to incorporate the learnings into operations and replicate them across our other flagship properties. We will publish the results in the coming year.

Child protection
We are committed to child protection - both those children we take on holiday and those in destinations. TUI Travel businesses have been engaged for many years in the protection of children in tourism, and many have policies, processes and training in place to help colleagues and customers recognise suspicious situations and report them to the proper authorities. Our Group-wide Child Protection Policy can be viewed here www.tuitravelplc.com. A number of TUI Travel businesses have signed the Child Protection Code www.thecode.org, and in 2010 this will be extended to all Mainstream Sector businesses.

Charity
In the last year, businesses supported more than 114 source market and destination charities with nearly 2 million Euros donatedⁱⁱ. Our Groupwide charity policy and guidelines help businesses to ensure transparency, report annual monies collected and manage charity relationships. 

Charitable activities at TUI Travel:

• World Care Fund www.thomson.co.uk/worldcarefund, www.hayesandjarvis.co.uk/worldcarefund 
• Futouris www.futouris.org 
• Peregrine & Gecko’s Community Trust www.peregrineadventures.com/community-trust 
• The Adventure Company Foundation www.adventurecompany.co.uk/responsible-travel 
• i-to-i Foundation www.i-to-i.com
   

"94% of our businesses support environmental and/or social projects in destinationsⁱⁱ"

We are conscious of the pressures that tourism can place on local populations and resources and therefore work collaboratively with communities, local and national governments, NGOs and trade associations to support sustainable management of destinations and shape our strategy in this area.

For example:

• We chair the ABTA (Association of British Travel Agents) Responsible Tourism Committee, responsible for pioneering the Travelife Sustainability System www.abta.com
• We chair the sustainable development committee of the Dutch Association of Travel Agents and Tour Operators (ANVR) and are a member of IDUT, the Dutch national network for sustainable development of outbound tourism www.anvr.travel
• We are working in partnership with Deutscher ReiseVerband (DRV), the German travel industry association, a patron of the Futouris initiative, a new platform for sustainable tourism www.drv.de 
• We are a member of The Tour Operators’ Initiative (TOI), a non-profit association working closely with UNWTO and UNEP to promote best practice in sustainable development among tour operators www.toinitiative.org 
• Our businesses, in particular our destination teams, work with local authorities and communities on relevant issues and we support their initiatives – 94% of businesses support environmental and/or social projects in destinationsⁱⁱ
• We are a core partner in the Tourism 2023 initiative, through which we are working to create a sustainable future for tourism www.forumforthefuture.org/tourism-2023
• We are working with the Overseas Development Institute to understand and increase our holidays’ benefit to local livelihoods www.odi.org.uk
• We have a TUI UK board director on the trustee board of the UK Travel Foundation, a charity which helps the travel industry understand, manage and take effective action on sustainable tourism www.thetravelfoundation.org.uk 
• We are working with Tourism Concern. Exodus, one of our Activity Sector brands, is a member of their Ethical Tour Operators’ Group and Tourism Concern works with the Group towards best practice www.tourismconcern.org.uk 
• We have been working with the Born Free Foundation since 1995, to improve the welfare of animals in captivity www.bornfree.org.uk
• We are working with the Dolphin Fund, to complement our dolphinarium auditing efforts worldwide www.dolphinfund.eu

"TUI Central Europe launched the industry sustainability initiative Futouris, which focuses on climate and biodiversity protection and the promotion of educational programmes www.futouris.org"