Erica AllisUnited Nations Environment ProgrammeEleventh Caribbean Conference on Sustainable Tourism DevelopmentMay 9th-13th St. Michael, Barbados

Opportunities for Sustainable Investment and Financing in

Tourism: The SIFT Network

How investment is often done

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So they build this

People want this

Two Faces of Tourism

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Sustainability and investment

Tourism is a key sector forthe shift to a Green Economy

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Why most tourism investment is not sustainable

The Sustainable Investment and Finance in Tourism (SIFT) Network is intended to resolve these problems

Investment and finance challenges on sustainability

Public Sector Private SectorLack of awareness and capacity Integrating sustainability as a relevant

factor for tourism investors Difficulties in integrating environmental, social, and governance issues

Delivering projects and investments on smaller scales

Challenges in driving innovation Demonstrating of positive influence of sustainability on tourism ROI

Lack of policies and guidelines Lack of transparency in claimed sustainable development

Lack of information Availability, knowledge, and acceptance of standard criteria or guidelines

Fragmentation of the tourism industry Developers lack incentives to adopt sustainable criteria

Lack of inter-donor coordination Investment focus on established companies, developers, and providers

The Sustainable Investment and Finance in Tourism (SIFT) Network

Sustainable Investment and Finance in Tourism (SIFT) Network

What is SIFT?

• A network to enable investors, financiers, and destinations to share knowledge and encourage investments in tourism development that is financially, environmentally, and socially sustainable.

What will SIFT do? Facilitate

sustainable investments

Tools to mainstream

Sustainability

Disseminate information

SIFT Stakeholders

SIFT Stakeholders

SIFT NetworkPlanned three steps:

Roadmap for SIFT

$$Projects

Local knowledge

Specialized

knowledge

Private sector buy-in

Criteria and standards

PoliciesProjectsProductsInformed consumers

SIFT and the Global Sustainable Tourism Partnership

Global Partnership

for Sustainable

Tourism

Tourism Sustainability Council (TSC)

Sustainable Investment and Finance in Tourism

(SIFT) Network

Regional Networks

United Nations agencies

and programs

First tools for SIFT

UNEP-WWF investment tool

Input-Output

Model

Environmenta

l Matrix

Forecastin

g Module

Investment Appraisal

Guidelines and sustainability checklist

Private Sector

Businesses

Public Sector

Socio-economic Module

Output Economic, environmental and socio-economic impact results

Output Benchmarking and forecasts

Input Expenditure and sales data

Input Tourist arrivals, expenditure data, employment data

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Fig. 1: Schematic Diagram of Proposed Model

UNEP-WWF investment tool

UNEP-WWF investment tool

UNEP-WWF investment tool

UNEP-WWF Investment tool

• Final stages of development• Looking for countries/destinations to pilot

the model

Thank you!

Erica Alliserica.allis@unep.org

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