AI is not a panacea for all our sustainability challenges but a powerful tool whose efficacy relies heavily on the blend of technological integration and human-centric strategies.
Hospitality largely relies on legacy technology to operate and remains very slow in adopting more useful, more user friendly and faster replacement/ enhancement solutions. AI is moving forward very rapidly and Hospitality must get on board quickly before finding itself behind.
The Role of AI in Net Positive Hospitality The World Sustainable Hospitality Alliance champions Net Positive Hospitality, where AI emerges not as a panacea but as a potent catalyst for sustainable transformation. The synergy of AI, traditional technologies, and human-centric strategies is paramount.
AI is just a tool just like any tool it's up to how people use it. It has potential usage in Energy Efficiency and Management. For example, optimising the distribution of electricity and managing demand. In climate predictions where it can help determine weather patterns.
Our global food systems need an overhaul. We are wasting food at every stage of the food cycle and a large proportion of the food we are growing is arguably not good for us or the planet – the waste of resources is magnified if the food we do produce minimal nutritional value in the first place.
The key question – not What, How
The reality is that the majority of professionals do not measure food waste. So not having the data is the first issue. The second issue is, once you have the data and understand the amount of waste you actually produce, how do you reduce it?
One of the biggest challenges we face is the very idea of hospitality. There is still a (strong) perception that to be hospitable means to be generous. That by giving more we are adding value, delivering a better experience, serving better.
Intuition tells us that what holds us back is the combination of all three aspects: our individual decisions, managers, and leaders. However, based on experience working with a restaurant chain in Brazil my short answer will be that organizations and their leaders are best positioned to lead a shifting course with the necessary speed if desired.
From the perspective of the Sustainable Hospitality Alliance and the Net Positive Hospitality philosophy, it's crucial that companies measure and report on a variety of social aspects. These include, but are not limited to, employee health and wellbeing, fair and equitable wages, diversity and inclusion, and human rights adherence. To ensure consistency and comparability, reports should utilize internationally recognized standards and frameworks such as the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) or the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB).
Organisations should be measuring the holistic well-being of all stakeholders under the Social component of the "ESG" Framework. An organisations stakeholders typically include employees, local communities, customers, and suppliers. Compared to Environmental ('E') metrics, Social ('S') metrics can be challenging to define and measure, but there are several emerging and established indices and tools that organisations can use to assess their Social imapct. Holistic well-being can be measured through six domains, as recommended by the comprehensive "Well-Being Assessment" (WBA) of the Human Flourishing Program, namely: Emotional Health, Physical Health, Meaning and Purpose, Character Strengths, Social Connectedness and Financial Security, developed by the Sustaianbility and Health Initiative for NetPositive Enterprise (SHINE) at Harvard's School of Public Health. The World Health Organisation's definition of health goes beyond mental and physical health to include the wholeness of a person. Social metrics in the EU are being standardized through the EU Social Taxonomy, a potentially new social reporting tool that will allow organisations to report against decent work, adequate living standards and inclusive and sustainable communities and societies. Companies can also report Social Sustainability against universally recognized protocol such as the UN Guiding Principles on Business & Human Rights or UNSDGs (SDG Goal 3: universal well-being), or more specific well-being indices such as the Happy Planet Index, the World Happiness Report, Global Happiness and Well-Being Policy Report, the OECD's Well-being framework or others. For an organization to effectively measure social sustainability and social impact, stakeholders must be engaged and incentivized to provide regular and real input. In additional to a organisation' immediate stakeholders, the "S" in ESG also considers the wider society(s) and political environment(s) in which an organization operates.
I would like to contribute to this HospitalityNet from the viewpoint of my independent consulting experience. Here, from 2021 through 2023, I had the opportunity to work with an Italian smart city affordable housing scale up, connecting their Community Development business unit to the Real Estate line of the business. It is part of their USP to offer Community Development services in the new settlements they build in Brazil and -in a joint venture- in India, and they deliver consulting services in community management in European Union countries, like Italy. In the last two years, the enterprise has matured the awareness that a specific ESG Department represented a new business opportunity, whereby their experience in environmental and social sustainability might be transferred through consulting services to the wider market. Their ESG capability is integrated in the newly formed Digital and Advisory department, based on their Italian state-of-the-art competence centre. In conclusion, such company, labeled as a potential Italian unicorn, might offer combined lessons
The main barrier to assessing the social aspect of ESG reporting is to first bring its importance in line with environmental sustainability. A recent study asked hotel guests to rate a list of circular economy practices based on a) their willingness to pay, b) their importance, and c) their intention to reserve a stay.¹ The results are extremely valuable for business owners when deciding how to combine environmental sustainability investments with enhanced guest satisfaction.
There are several factors and variables to consider in reporting about social sustainability. For example, VIRTU Resorts is currently focusing on measuring culture and well-being, extending to include Indigenous knowledge. VIRTU's enriched business practices are rooted in the holistic connections between communities and the environment paired with the latest in technology.
When it comes to incorporating the social aspect in ESG reporting, prioritising the well-being and investment of staff members is paramount. Companies should focus on revaluing their workforce by allocating resources towards training, retention strategies, and ensuring fair compensation.
In the hospitality industry - just like in the business world in general - a paradigm shift is necessary [see NRDC], which calls for radical changes.
Radical changes are undoubtedly called for in a world struggling to cope with climate change, and in my own country that is in the verge of being governed by politicians denying climate science. It is certainly called for in a tourism and hospitality sector that is still managed on the basis of traditional economic measures: number of visitors, number of overnight stays, average spending, guest satisfaction, growth in numbers, markets and destinations. Annual dashboards and programs are always framed in positivity: road maps for flourishing economies, objectives to achieve climate neutrality, set comfortably far ahead in time—2030 is usually the closest date. In contrast to these cautious, mainly voluntary strategies, some economists warn that the current economic system will inevitably destroy planetary resources: they predict scenarios of degrowth and government-imposed budgeting of consumption.
At first glance, you might think things don't look too great for decoupling and green growth in hospitality. Recent research reveals not only a lack of empirical evidence supporting Paris-compliant decoupling [1], but posit that high-income nations that have fallen short of realizing green growth, are very unlikely to do so in the near future [2]. Furthermore, the management paradigms within the hospitality & tourism industry, characterized by relatively brief tenures of general managers and evaluations primarily focused on short-term return on investments, fail to foster an environment conducive to risk-taking, creativity, and radical change [3].
Radical Changes are needed. That is in how we build, how we operate, how we report and communicate ESG initiatives, but also in how we think as owners, operators, employees, and as guests.The biggest change the industry needs to address is the mindset. Mindset from all stakeholders involved is needed for a successful change.
In the dynamic landscape of the hospitality industry, orchestrating a sustainable paradigm involves a judicious fusion of incremental and transformative measures.
Considering the scale, scope and pressing nature of the major sustainability challenges at hand:
For me, it is not a case of which, it is about marrying the two. When it comes to radical changes or incremental shifts, action was required decades ago, the greatest risk of all is not doing anything. Therefore, the pathway to sustainability requires a thoughtful blend of continuous improvement and radical change.
In the hospitality industry - just like in the business world in general - a paradigm shift is necessary , which calls for radical changes. I see 3 priorities that are implementable by key hospitality stakeholders if they decide to work together (which can be a radical change for some of them already…): Hotel operators and their suppliers: Zero plastic Hotel investors and franchisors: Zero land take All: choose and aim for new KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) for the industry, before and above financial results, which would inspire hospitality leaders in their mission.
The challenges facing decoupling and green growth in the hospitality industry are evident, with current mainstream practices yielding insufficient progress. However, a departure from the prevalent notion that decoupling and tourism growth can happen simultaneously, coupled with a redirection towards an alternative paradigm of value creation in the form of regenerative hospitality, shows a more promising futureproof path for our industry.
Should we stop building hotels in risk areas? That's a loaded question and depends on how risks are assessed. Has the assessment included all "natural" hazards like earthquakes, floods, GLOFs, hurricanes, landslides, heat waves and drought? What about anthropogenic hazards like industrial accidents and terrorism? More importantly, does the assessment include the impacts of climate change over time? It has to.
Coming from a hotel asset management perspective and based on my empirical observations these last years, it seems to me that hotel values (both of existing properties and of development projects) dangerously ignore climate risks.
As hotel asset valuations are increasingly linked to sustainability features and environmental risk exposure, do you foresee this trend changing the overall approach to hotel development and, if so, how?
Climate change will impact all aspects of tourism, particularly lodging. From construction to operations, from changes in market mix and demand to risk mitigation, we must adapt to the new reality.