About the Conference
Sustainable Development Goals
The year 2015 marks a breakthrough for global development as the 193 countries of the UN General Assembly adopted the 2030 Development Agenda titled Transforming our world: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. Building on the Millennium Development Goals, the 2030 Agenda outlines 17 ambitious Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that seek to tackle a range of economic, social and environmental imperatives. They include eradicating poverty and hunger, ensuring health and well-being, strengthening economic growth and social progress, empowering communities, providing quality education, safeguarding peace and equality, combating climate change, fostering environmental protection, and encouraging global and local participation and partnership. These SDGs and the 169 associated targets are people-oriented, transformative, universal and integrated. All countries and stakeholders have been called to act on the implementation of the agenda in the pursuit of a sustainable and resilient future.
Tourism in the
2030 Agenda
Being one of the largest industries of the world, tourism is firmly positioned in the 2030 Agenda. The World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) has affirmed the role of tourism and its enormous potential to contribute to all of the SDGs in direct and indirectly ways. Efforts have been devoted to harness the capacity of sustainable tourism and mobilize nations, industries and communities to help achieve the SDGs. In particular, emphasis is placed on Goals 8, 12, and 14, in which sustainable tourism is respectively recognized as a vital force in boosting inclusive economic growth and providing employment opportunities, promoting sustainable consumption and production patterns, and supporting the conservation and sustainable use of marine resources.
Goal 8: Promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all.
Goal 12: Ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns.
Goal 14: Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development.
In response to the UN’s call for action in which governments, private sectors and civil societies are urged to take necessary measures to realize tourism’s potential to contribute to the SDGs, a number of questions should be considered and addressed:
• How does tourism embody and accelerate sustainability, and provide pragmatic solutions to sustainable development?
• How does sustainable tourism foster economic growth, ensure a fair distribution of economic benefits, and create decent work for communities?
• How does sustainable tourism eradicate poverty and hunger, and safeguard the health and well-being of people?
• How does sustainable tourism make societies more equitable and inclusive, promote education and build knowledge among people, and empower communities especially women?
• How does sustainable tourism stimulate resilient and innovative infrastructure, city and rural development?
• How does sustainable tourism fortify sustainable consumption and production patterns, assist in environmental and resource protection, secure reliable energy and clean resources, and battle climate change?
• How does sustainable tourism promote global peace and understanding, and encourage engagement and collaborations among stakeholders?
• How can tourism policies, business operations and individual behaviours align with the values of the SDGs?
• What challenges does sustainable tourism face in its endeavour to contribute to the SDGs?
• Has the promise of tourism as a tool for driving forward global sustainability been exaggerated where its potential is more imaginative than actual? How should the unsustainable aspects of tourism be confronted and dealt with?
Objectives
The upcoming International Conference on Tourism and Sustainable Development Goals in May 2019 seeks to address these questions and beyond. It offers a platform to tourism scholars, researchers, practitioners and students to interact and debate issues relating to sustainable tourism and the SDGs. It aspires to instigate critical reflection upon the role of tourism in contributing to the SDGs and advancing global development.
Conference Topics
The Conference Organizing Committee welcomes contributions to any topical areas in the field of tourism research, and is particularly seeking contributions to the following areas:
Your presentations can be based on a range of tourism forms:
History
Since 2012, the Department of Geography and Resource Management (GRMD) and the Master of Social Science in Sustainable Tourism (MSSST) programme of The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) have organized thematic international conferences on sustainable tourism annually. These conferences have attracted well-known and reputable international tourism academics as keynote speakers, invited speakers and presenters to share knowledge and exchange ideas. Apart from researchers and practitioners, students from international, regional and local institutes have also attended the conferences to widen their scope of learning and to gain global perspectives on the development of the tourism industry. All participants have brought together novel ideas and empirical evidence surrounding issues of sustainable tourism.
2016
The 2016 International Conference on Sustainable Tourism and Global-local Understanding has attracted over 150 participants. Keynote speakers included Prof. Richard BUTLER (The University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, U.K.), Prof. Jaume GUIA (Universitat de Girona, Spain), Prof. Amran HAMZAH (Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, Malaysia), Prof. Alan LEW (Northern Arizona University, U.S.A.), Prof. Trevor SOFIELD (University of Tasmania, Australia), and Prof. Geoffrey WALL (University of Waterloo, Canada).
2017
The 2017 International Conference on Sustainable Tourism and Development has attracted over 120 participants. Keynote speakers included Prof. T. C. CHANG (National University of Singapore, Singapore), Prof. Jaume GUIA (Universitat de Girona, Spain), Prof. Amran HAMZAH (Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, Malaysia), Prof. Alan LEW (Northern Arizona University, U.S.A.), Prof. Geoffrey WALL (University of Waterloo, Canada), Prof. Philip Feifan XIE (The Macau University of Science and Technology, Macau, China), and Prof. Honggang XU (Sun Yat-Sen University, China).
2018
The 2018 International Conference on Sustainable Tourism and Innovation has attracted over 100 participants. Keynote speakers included Dr. Dora AGAPITO (University of Lincoln, U.K.), Prof. Amran HAMZAH (Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, Malaysia), and Prof. Geoffrey WALL (University of Waterloo, Canada).
