The World Tourism Organization (UNWTO), Hilton and the WYSE Travel Confederation will join forces ahead of International Youth Day at the Youth General Assembly at the United Nations Headquarters to highlight tourism's capacity to empower youth.

The New York event is part of the International Year of Sustainable Tourism for Development 2017 framework, and will focus on the tourism industry's potential to create jobs, provide entrepreneurship opportunities, and deliver a more responsible tourism sector for today's Youth.

Young people represent around 23% of the 1,235 million tourists travelling internationally each year. The event will discuss the contribution of this influential to world peace and a better future through sustainable tourism.

"Youth can be a powerful catalyst to advance the contribution of tourism to the Sustainable Development Goals, particularly Goal 8 on economic growth and jobs, and Goal 12 on sustainable consumption and production as they can lead a transformation into a more responsible way of travelling" said Sandra Carvao, Chief Communications at UNWTO.

Hilton and the International Youth Foundation plan to preview the latest Global Youth Wellbeing Index, revealing that young people are "plugged in," and yet disconnected from vital skills, economic opportunities, local communities and governments. Reconnecting Youth is an urgent need at this moment in history when half of the world's population is under 30.

"Our future depends on resilient and thriving societies, and this starts with young people. To help better understand the challenges facing Young people, Hilton collaborated with the International Youth Foundation to commission the Global Youth Wellbeing Index," said Daniella Foster, Senior Director of Global Corporate Responsibility, Hilton. "To better equip today's Youth for the workforce, Hilton has committed to opening our doors to one million young people by 2019. As of today, we are more than half way there."

The Global Report on the Power of Youth Travel by UNWTO and the WYSE Travel Confederation shows that youth and student travel markets are increasingly important and resilient. It also concludes that youth travel spend more on local communities and thus represent a growing opportunity for socio-economic development.

The event will also highlight the role of tourism in the accomplishment of the SDGs, in particular for Youth, through job creation, entrepreneurship and social inclusion. It will also look into the future of tourism jobs and skills development.

Participants include leaders and influencers including:

  • Sandra Carvao, Chief, Communications, UNWTO
  • Daniella Foster, Senior Director of Global Corporate Responsibility, Hilton
  • Russ Hedge, Representative of WYSE Travel Confederation and Hostelling International
  • Susan Reichle, President, International Youth Foundation
  • Kelley Louise, Executive Director, Travel SocialGood and Travel Blogger
  • Shoaib Rizvi, Youth Assembly Awardee 2017

About UN Tourism

The World Tourism Organization (UN Tourism) is the United Nations agency responsible for the promotion of responsible, sustainable and universally accessible tourism.

As the leading international organization in the field of tourism, UN Tourism promotes tourism as a driver of economic growth, inclusive development and environmental sustainability and offers leadership and support to the sector in advancing knowledge and tourism policies worldwide.

Our Priorities

Mainstreaming tourism in the global agenda: Advocating the value of tourism as a driver of socio-economic growth and development, its inclusion as a priority in national and international policies and the need to create a level playing field for the sector to develop and prosper.

Promoting sustainable tourism development: Supporting sustainable tourism policies and practices: policies which make optimal use of environmental resources, respect the socio-cultural authenticity of host communities and provide socio-economic benefits for all.

Fostering knowledge, education and capacity building: Supporting countries to assess and address their needs in education and training, as well as providing networks for knowledge creation and exchange.

Improving tourism competitiveness: Improving UN Tourism Members' competitiveness through knowledge creation and exchange, human resources development and the promotion of excellence in areas such as policy planning, statistics and market trends, sustainable tourism development, marketing and promotion, product development and risk and crisis management.

Advancing tourism's contribution to poverty reduction and development: Maximizing the contribution of tourism to poverty reduction and achieving the SDGs by making tourism work as a tool for development and promoting the inclusion of tourism in the development agenda.

Building partnerships: Engaging with the private sector, regional and local tourism organizations, academia and research institutions, civil society and the UN system to build a more sustainable, responsible and competitive tourism sector.

Our Structure

Members: An intergovernmental organization, UN Tourism has 160 Member States, 6 Associate Members, 2 Observers and over 500 Affiliate Members.

Organs: The General Assembly is the supreme organ of the Organization. The Executive Council take all measures, in consultation with the Secretary-General, for the implementation of the decisions and recommendations of the General Assembly and reports to the Assembly.

Secretariat: UN Tourism headquarters are based in Madrid, Spain. The Secretariat is led by the Secretary-General and organized into departments covering issues such as sustainability, education, tourism trends and marketing, sustainable development, statistics and the Tourism Satellite Account (TSA), destination management, ethics and risk and crisis management. The Technical Cooperation and Silk Road Department carries out development projects in over 100 countries worldwide, while the Regional Departments for Africa, the Americas, Asia and the Pacific, Europe and the Middle East serve as the link between UN Tourism and its 160 Member States. The Affiliate Members Department represents UN Tourism's 500 plus Affiliate members.

Rut Gómez Sobrino
Principal Media Officer
(+34) 91 567 81 60
UN Tourism