Implementation & Adoption of Carbon footprint in Tourism travel packages

There is a growing awareness within the tourism industry as well as among tourists of the carbon footprints of tourism. The purpose of the Implementation & Adoption of Carbon footprint in Tourism travel packages (IMPACT) pathfinder project is a market analysis to investigate the interest in a global standard for carbon footprint assessment and carbon management of tourism packages.

Tourism is not only the largest, growing industry in the world, it also accounts for 5 to 12 % of global greenhouse gas emissions. At the same time, more and more tourists require information about carbon footprints of tourism packages. Yet, reliable data to determine this is lacking. The same can be said for the tourism industry, such as tour operators, travel agencies, e-business sales operators  and in business travel corporations. Although they realise that they need to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions, they now have no means to calculate the carbon footprint of all of their products and services in a reliable and mainly automated way.