USTOA’s Terry Dale
The United States Tour Operators Association (USTOA) is bringing its
exclusive SIR summit to the Republic and Asia for the first time in May
2024. The association promotes integrity within the tour operator
industry and will hold its third Sustainability is Responsibility (SIR)
Summit in Singapore from May 18 through 21, 2024 in partnership with the
Singapore Tourism Board (STB).
The event is designed as an executive-level interactive conference
with inspirational, interactive and educational content, aiming to give
attendees valuable insight, a chance to reflect, discuss, learn and gain
knowledge for business development purposes. It will draw around 45
executive level attendees, CEOs and directors.
USTOA president & CEO, Terry Dale, explained how STB helped in
bringing this event to Singapore: “STB immediately reached out to USTOA
upon the news that Singapore has been certified as a sustainable destination based on the Global Sustainable Tourism Council (GSTC)’s Destination Criteria, after being the first to apply the certification process on a country level. STB expressed interest in hosting the next SIR summit,
as one of their own team members attended SIR 2.0 in Norway and was
inspired to bring these experiences and conversations to Singapore,
where the topic of sustainability is incorporated into many aspects of
their personal and business lives.”
Attendees are set to foster collaborations, participate in
cross-sector learning, and move towards a more sustainable future for
the travel industry. The Summit, which drew 52 top level executives this
year, will bring representatives from across the travel industry value
chain to the table for interactive dialog, educational content and case
studies with the aim of fostering future collaborations, innovative
approaches and cross-sector education.
Some of the outcomes of this year's summit:
· the need for tour operators to collectively work together to
achieve sustainability goals, regardless of where each company is
individually on their sustainability journey.
· the importance of tour operators and vendors being vulnerable
and honest about their experiences (successes and failures) while
implementing sustainability initiatives.
· the industry’s collective stance of how large of an impact
(both negative and positive) members’ direct choices as tour operators
and travelers have on the local communities and places that are visited
· the need for tour operators to respond to the rapid increase in customer demand for sustainable travel.
The final selection of delegates is at the sole discretion of USTOA
and STB. The registration fee will be US$300 per delegate. The third
edition of the event follows after USTOA’s second Summit
in Norway which was held in Tromsø and Svalbard from April 18-23, 2023.