Evaluation of measures to prevent plastic waste in hotels in selected tourism regions of the Mediterranean Sea
Abstract
Between 4.8 and 12.7 million tons of plastic waste enter the world’s oceans and seas every year. Tourism, particularly the hotel industry, is a main source of waste, especially plastic waste, in regions where the waste disposal infrastructure is underdeveloped. More and more plastic accumulates in the sea, where it remains for a long time, slowly breaking down into smaller and smaller particles. The amount of waste in the sea increases by 40 percent during the summer months when 320 million tourists come to the Mediterranean to vacation every year. Plastic pollution has a negative impact on tourism, the main business sector in the Mediterra-nean region. Tourists prefer clean, well-kept beaches over polluted ones. Under these conditions, beaches covered with plastic waste threaten jobs in the tourism industry. In addition to improving waste management in the respective regions, avoidance measures such as eliminating disposable plastic packaging and products in the hotel industry are needed urgently. Avoiding the use of plastic in the hotel industry will help to eliminate such waste in the first place, defusing the problems caused by insufficient disposal infrastructures. WWF Germany carries out a study to identify and evaluate measures for avoiding plastic waste in the hotel industry through research and interviews with stakeholders in the hotel industry in select tourist destinations along the Mediterranean. The aim is to ascertain relevant information about • The extent to which worthwhile avoidance measures could be implemented by the hotel industry; • The extent to which avoidance measures have already been implemented in the hotel industry; • How effective these measures are or could be; • What best practice examples are known; • What obstacles the industry is faced in order to effectively go ahead with avoid-ing plastic waste;
plastic waste plastic Mediterranean Sea waste prevention toursim
Publikationen
Mitarbeiter*Innen
Gudrun Obersteiner
Dipl.-Ing. Dr. Gudrun Obersteiner
gudrun.obersteiner@boku.ac.at
Tel: +43 1 47654-81319
Project Leader
01.04.2019 - 31.12.2019