Derek Moore: 'Travel, if correctly delivered, can be a force for good'

At Aito’s November 2019 Overseas Conference in Wroclaw, Poland, one topic dominated the conversation – climate change. By the end of the conference it had become the climate emergency.

Closing the conference, I announced Aito was setting up a think tank to develop a stance on the issue and draft a response on behalf of the sector. No when or how had been decided at that stage, but the first meeting of the think tank took place in early January.

Attending were the original six Aito members who came up with the idea during a discussion at the Aito conference late-night bar.

At this first meeting, all agreed the climate emergency was not only a threat to the world as we know it, but also a direct threat to our businesses. Failure to engage – with both the travel industry and our clients – would mean we were very unlikely to be in business in 10 years’ time.

We agreed that, as tour operators, we had to provide a coherent explanation to consumers about why we continued to operate our businesses. Our consumer message must be that travel – if correctly delivered – can still be a force for good.

As specialist holiday companies, we work with airlines, destinations and their tourist boards from around the world. We need to engage with them all, but also – most importantly – with governments worldwide.

Doing nothing is simply not an option when so much is at stake; we need to ensure, for example, the UK government does not impose so-called solutions on us with which we disagree.