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  Tourism in the French Government's vision : how can tourism growth be made sustainable ?

Mr. Léon BERTRAND - Secretary of State for Tourism, France

 

Mr. President,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

I am happy to conclude this 4th Summits of Tourism dedicated to the new connections between tourism and culture, and I thank you, Mr. President, for having given me the opportunity.

I believe that the whole set of themes considered in the course of these three days accurately displays the goal that we have to pose to ourselves as officials and professionals in the world of tourism.

While it is a flourishing economic sector, and a factor of social and economic development, tourism is not exempt from criticisms and we must acknowledge them. Today, the question of the sustainability of human activities is central to the management of public policies. The domain of tourism is characteristic of the underlying issues.

My approach, as an official in this sector within the Government, centres on three convictions :

• First of all, tourism is a major economic sector in France and in the world, on the way to becoming the most important;
• One may notice, however, a certain vulnerability of this sector, and the volatility of its socio-cultural foundations challenge us with respect to its development;
• Finally, the implementation of the principles of sustainable development must allow us to reinforce this sector and to confront the challenges which await us, because these principles favour a comprehensive approach;

This is why I willingly have become involved on the project for sustainable development that has just been launched by the Prime Minister and of which I will speak in the last part of my speech.

Situation of French Tourism

First of all, I am going to outline in broad strokes the situation of the sector for which I am responsible and its place among the world tourism economies.

In 2001, our country kept its rank as premier destination in the world. Despite the international events of September 11, 2001, we welcomed 76.5 million visitors.

Our tourism is the leading French industry, with 15.2 billion Euros in 2001, representing 7% of the GDP.

We can be proud to recall these excellent results.

Foreign clients have remained loyal to our country and the results recorded in the hotel industry sector are on the whole stable: during the first nine months of 2002, the number of overnight stays is almost identical to those recorded in the same period for the preceding year.

But we must remain vigilant.

The tragic attacks on the island of Bali remind us, once again, of the extreme fragility of the tourism economy.

Issues for Tourism in the World

In this regard, it is necessary to reinforce our international presence.

We must pursue our efforts of promoting the image of France with our European neighbours, especially because they partly compensate for the drop in the American and Asian clientele.

I wish, then, on the one hand, to increase the promotion of our country, in collaboration with Maison de la France and, on the other hand, to best use our diplomatic networks to promote the image of France abroad. I notably participated in the Conference of Ambassadors last August and they are now more supportive of the idea that French tourism is a component of foreign policy and that it constitutes a major economic issue.

Furthermore, I mean to give a new boost to the cooperation agreements that tie us to numerous countries on the fundamental levelthat the sharing of our tourism know-how represents.

These few examples illustrate the necessary research that our tourism sector must conduct in order to renew its resources and open itself to new opportunities.

New Tendencies

In fact, perspectives, even in the short term, are more and more difficult to anticipate in the face of international tensions.

In other respects, today’s tourism sector is seeing profound changes. Under the effect of globalisation, and of the European construction and economic strategies, consolidations in the tourism sector are multiplying. Travel agencies, reservation systems, transportation, and the hotel industry are currently undergoing partnerships and mergers.

The new technologies are involving tourism in a new era, that of interactive information, promotion and distribution on-line. Mastering this tool is inescapable.

While the services offered are reorganising, the demand of tourism consumers is also evolving. This demand is characterised now by an increased expectation in matters of price and quality, and by opportunistic and unpredictable behaviour of the traveller in their choice of destinations.

Even more recently, a demand has appearedfor tourism products that are more respectful of the environment, cultures and humans.

More and more, tourists are highly prizing values and local cultural identity; integration in the physical and human setting; participation in activities, customs and the inhabitants’ ways of life; and enriching social connections.

It is important to acknowledge these new aspects of tourism services and these new expectations of tourism clients in the implementation of a new policy of proactivetourism.

I am convinced that the perpetuation of tourism activities must realise of the principles of sustainable development. The professionals of the tourism sector must formulate their principles of care for natural and cultural resources, social equity and the ethics of economic growth to insure their future.

Aside on the Association’s Activities

In the framework of reflections developing around these problems, I insist on particularly saluting the activity of your association, Mr. President.

On the one hand, the projects that have taken place during these meetings since Wednesday have been of a remarkable quality. On the other hand, I note the importance of capitalising on the knowledge that the organisation made possible in this manner since 1999, and the structuring of the permanent network that your collaborators are carrying forward.

Your association has firmly seized the ambitious theme of sustainable development and I measure the extent of the work accomplished.

This work fully legitimates the support that my Secretariat of State gives you and for which I am thrilled. Indeed, the task that falls to us—to reinforce this sector and optimise its benefits for the entire society—remains immense.

The response to the evolution that affects tourism activities, which I was recalling earlier, can only come, in my opinion, from attaining a very high level of quality of services, while simultaneously integrating principles of sustainable development in the policies on which these activities depend.

The Qualité France Plan

Confronted with an abundant tourism offering and faced with an increasingly demanding clientele, we must adopt a policy of proactive tourism, which cannot be conceived of without significant investment in quality control.

One of the projects that I am leading is precisely in this matter.

Organising a genuine "Qualité France" Plan for tourism falls within the goals of security and principles of sustainability desired by the President of the Republic. Quality is the guarantor of the continuity of tourism activities and trades.

It also corresponds to a high demand from French and foreign clientele. Behaviours change; we must adapt to them.

It is also quality that positions our services on the market to face up to the competition, especially in Europe or in the Caribbean.

In each of our projects, we must integrate this idea as the main thread of any approach.

Developing high-quality tourism also requires that we insure its sustainability through a larger acknowledgment of the natural, cultural and social environment of territories, and through the policies that will be implemented.

The Issues for Sustainable Tourism

France has become a world tourism benchmark in the area of sustainable development, but as the numerous questions that could be picked out from the preceding debates have shown, much remains to be done.

Indeed, as a social phenomenon and source of economic development, tourism is the cause of potentially strong pressures on the environment if regulatory policies are not put in place.

Moreover, since 80 % of occupancy takes place on only 20% of the national territory, I will take as a priority the balancing of the tourism flux between the different kinds of spaces, by drawing inspiration from principles of sustainable development: control of the spatial and temporal concentrations proper to tourism, taking into account the natural risks, management of transfers, etc.…

Diverse fields of action are involved : respect for the environment by tourism operators and tourists, the management of activities by the receiving communities, attractive schedules, and vacations accessible to the largest number of people.

In the strategies for local development, the issue of a partnership and the participation of citizens is decisive for the development of tourism activities. For this, it is necessary to bring together the partners from diverse sectors of culture, tourism, the economy, the environment, and especially to combine the inhabitants therein.

This policy, based on the quality of facilities, on people and on the sustainability of the development, should find an echo in the metropolis, just as in our departments and overseas territories.

The Government’s Policy for Sustainable Development

As you know, the day after the World Summit of Sustainable Development in Johannesburg, the President of the Republic asked the Government to meet and give “a decisive impetus” to this question, with the goal of making France one of the world’s principal actors in sustainable development.

I will quite obviously register my future action in the context of this spirit, born during the governmental seminar on sustainable development that took place November 28, presided over by the Prime Minister and in which, of course, I participated. This demonstrates the will of the Government to place sustainable development at the heart of public action and to acknowledge its consequences in the medium and long terms.

The goal of this seminar was to “give sustainable development a major standing and to integrate it into the whole of public policies”. The government intends to examine each public action in its economic, social and environmental aspect.

The desire to integrate sustainable development in public policies implies the deployment of a national strategy of sustainable development.

The national strategy of sustainable development, which will be elaborated upon here in the spring, will make it possible to specify these goals and the strategic lines of development in all areas of public action, and I fully intend for tourism to find its place there. Around 4 or 5 plans of action will be finalised.

In setting up this strategy, the President of the Republic and the Prime Minister have wished to restructure and reinforce the State’s action and also to associate the civil partnership with economic and local officials in this plan. Thus, the Interministerial Committee for Sustainable Development and the National Council for Sustainable Development will be created.

The governmental seminar established the main lines for the elaboration of the strategy. For four of them, my ministry will have to play a major role. It will involve the following themes: economic development and sustainable development; territories and sustainable development; information, awareness, education, and participation ; and finally, international action.

The Place of the Economy and Tourism Service in the Governmental Plan

I decided to mobilise all of my services to actively contribute to this ambitious challenge.

At the same time as the permanent committee of the Interministerial Committee of Sustainable Development will be conducting its work, I wished to mobilise and engage a very large representation of tourism professionals in thinking about the tourism content of this strategy.

This is an association of elected members; large federations representing local communities in the matter of tourism; professionals; associations that work in articulating tourism and sustainable development; national and professional associations; and experts falling under diverse themes of the sector.

This strategy aims to improve the transparency, the information and the public’s participation in public decisions.

I am benefiting from the opportunity to address you who represent a multiplicity of points of view on tourism, to tell you how happy I am to gather your proposals in order to further enrich the deliberations in progress.

Sustainable development is more than a concept, it is a general approach and I grant the highest importance to the dialogue, the only guarantee of quality work in this domain.

Conclusion

We have seen, in the course of this summit, that tourism is not only an economic fact, but also encompasses a considerable extent of the social field.

I am convinced that one can optimise one’s benefits for the whole of society, and improve the fate of individuals who comprise it, thanks especially to the effects of tourism activities.

The universality of human aspirations towards travel and discovery is one of the driving forces of globalisation.

For my part, I think that the implementation of sustainable tourism development will make it possible to positively reorient the evolution of this increasingly interdependent world.

Thank you.

Léon BERTRAND