An hour after the terrorism attack in London, which struck at the heart of its tourist centre, I first spoke to Louis D’Amore about the link between tourism and peace. As the drama unfolded in the shadow of Big Ben and on Westminster Bridge – two of London’s main tourist landmarks – his views on the interconnectedness of peace and tourism sounded especially pertinent.

“When I first proposed the idea for a tourism and peace conference, in the early 1980s, industry leaders in Canada asked what tourism has got to do with peace,” says D’Amore. “Their view was that peace is the government’s job and the industry should focus on things it can control.

“Then, in 1985, terrorism around the world peaked, with attacks mainly aimed on the tourism industry, including the TWA aeroplane hijacking and massacres at airports in Rome and Vienna. My consultancy company was monitoring terrorism as part of our futures research on the tourism industry and we saw that tourism, around the world, declined a one-third.

Industry leaders then saw the connection: without peace, there can be no tourism,” he says.

As a result, the Tourism Industry Association of Canada (TIAC), unanimously endorsed the idea for an International Conference on Tourism and Peace, so the creation of the International Institute for Peace through Tourism began to gain momentum. The first Global Tourism Conference took place in 1988, and featured video messages from then-US president Ronald Reagan and the Pope.

Higher purpose for tourism
At a time when the industry was focused on mass tourism, the Vancouver conference introduced the concept of sustainable tourism, as well as a new paradigm for a higher purpose of tourism: that it could be used to promote international understanding; collaboration among nations; protect the environment and preserve biodiversity; enhance cultures and value heritage; sustainable development; poverty reduction and healing wounds of conflict.

Since the inaugural conference, the IIPT has organised 18 conferences and summits, as well as many seminars and workshops, and developed the first code of ethics and guidelines for sustainable tourism. This year is the 30th anniversary and the global summit will be held in Montreal, with sustainable tourism for development and peace at the top of the agenda.

“IIPT was formed firstly with a vision to make travel and tourism the world’s first formal peace industry,” says D’Amore. “Every traveller is potentially an ambassador for peace. When you travel, you realise we have more in common than we have differences.”

Indeed, at the end of the Cold War Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev encouraged travel between the two countries to encourage Americans and Russians to better understand each other.

Broadening segments
The tourism industry is expanding all the time. When D’Amore first started assessing the industry in the 1970s, there was simply mass tourism. Now there are many different segments.

Ecotourism became popular in the late 1980s, followed by adventure tourism, cultural tourism and volunteer tourism. Then came agrotourism, wine tourism, culinary tourism, medical tourism and, recently, wellness tourism. D’Amore predicts that the moon will soon be the ultimate destination – and SpaceX plans the first tourist journey around the moon for 2018/9.

Tourism is one of the world’s largest and fastest growing industries and accounts, directly and indirectly, for one in every 10 jobs, according to D’Amore. This is expected to continue, because when people become more prosperous, one of the first priorities they have is to travel. D’Amore predicts the tourism industry will continue to grow in most areas of the world, particularly in Asia.

However, while destinations, such as Rwanda, Colombia, Vietnam, Iran and Sri Lanka, are making the most of peace time by promoting their tourism offerings, other popular destinations have become victims of their own success, such as Barcelona and Venice, each of which has exceeded their carrying capacity for tourism.

“Tourism has so overrun Venice that the people who historically lived there can’t afford to live there anymore. In time, this changes the nature of the city and the experience visitors have. Large cruise ships are not helping the situation,” says D’Amore. “Tourism needs to be directed to those areas which have an excess of ecological capacity, such as Africa, which offers excellent tourism opportunities, with many national parks and protected areas and cultural tourism. At the same time, the growth of tourism in these areas creates employment and entrepreneurial opportunities, particularly for groups such as women and the young.”