The UN Symposium on sustainable tourism, October 14 – 16 will be hosted in Tehran by the Cultural Heritage Organization and UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UN DESA), under the auspices of Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Department of Environment and UN Development Program (UNDP).
“Tourism is an activity that has grown by around 25 per cent in the past 10 years. It now accounts for around 10 per cent of the world’s economic activity and is one of the main generators of employment. However, it also has major impacts on the natural and built environments and on the wellbeing and culture of host populations…The concept of sustainable development has become widely accepted as the way to a better future…” cites the UN Environment Program (UNEP) in its guide for policy makers.
To this end, the event aims to bring sustainable development planning into mainstream tourism policies, placing particular emphasis on enhancing sustainable tourism, urbanization, resource efficiency, biodiversity and environmental protection.
At the opening session, Rouhani Movahed, deputy for tourism at the Cultural Heritage Organization will give the welcome speech.
Soltanifar, vice-president and head of Iran Cultural Heritage, Handicrafts and Tourism Organization (ICHTO) will make the opening remarks,this is followed by remarks of Gary Lewis, UNDP resident representative.
The keynote speaker will be Dr. Jahangiri, first vice-president, as stated in the itinerary of the event at sustainabledevelopment.un.org.
The technical program of the UN symposium will be introduced by senior sustainable development officer of UN DESA, New York Reza Salamat, and independent advisor on sustainable development policies, Berlin, Germany Ralph Wahnschafft.
