By Professor Geoff Lipman, Chairman, Green Growth 2050

The Summer School again brought together some 40 thinkers and learners from every continent, for a week of discussions, which included some 20 interactive lectures on core sustainability challenges and opportunities for society generally and for Travel & Tourism specifically. It included a visit to the National Park, Hoge Kempen, led by its charismatic Director Ignace Schops, an introduction to the European Parliament and the Commission’s 2020 Horizons research program, as well as an engaging keynote on renewable energy futures, by Tom Goldberg MBE, the Chairman of SunArk. The faculty included academic, industry, NGO and community specialists as well as experts in technology, marketing and biodiversity conservation.

The focus was on three key issues:

• The coming low carbon, inclusionary and conservationist, post 2015 world – following Global Summits on Development Finance, Sustainable Development Goals and Climate Response Targets.

• Green Growth potential for the Travelism (Travel & Tourism) sector – considering communities and companies; mobility, with special attention to aviation; ITC and mobile connectivity; biodiversity conservation, metrics, modelling and big data, local economic and life-style prioritization.

• The SUN program as a possible community delivery mechanism with global connectivity – with in depth presentations on development of the prefabricated, photovoltaic auditorium, the cloud based digital platform for civic connection and mobile applications, as well as the community research, learning and delivery programs.

The highlight was again the Maurice Strong Reflections, held in the “Open University of Diversity” Studio of award winning Belgian Artist Koen Vanmechelen, surrounded by his unique sculptures and pictures linking art, science and humanity. His colleague and friend Ignace Schops explained the origins of the movement in which the artist had started to explore our world through the interaction of birds, nature and humanity. He talked about his own connections with Koen, initially through biodiversity and continuing with the Climate Science Project they are undertaking with the University of Hasselt at the National Park: he also recalled the close involvement of Chido Guevara an activist growing mushrooms to support orphaned children in Africa and explained the links between food, genetics and nature.

Finally in this context, Geoffrey Lipman President of ICTP talked about the influence of Maurice Strong on his own belief in Green Growth, the connections with Ignace/Koen/Chido, which crystallized at the first “Reflections” and the firm belief that this will be a very critical element of the SUN program as it rolls out later this year.

The session covered:

• An overview by Felix Dodds of consciousness raising on sustainability and related global events of the past decades, leading up to the SDG and Climate Change Summits in the second half of this year. He identified the engaged kind of “glocal” response actions needed by the Travel & Tourism sector if it is to be a part of the mainstream of change. He placed significant emphasis on meaningful sustainability impact indicators, noting that there would be 17 Goals with 169 sub targets and underscored the depth of the challenges as well as the need for major shifts of thinking/action to respond successfully.

• Some seminal thoughts from Professor Harold Goodwin on the distinction between sustainable and responsible – with the latter incorporating the need to act. Also on the failure of humanity to understand or respond adequately to the scale, scope or immediacy of the challenge of Climate Change – and the generally irresponsible performance of the sector. He felt that time is running out while people develop long indicator lists rather than the means to make changes. He was also very, very pessimistic about the build-up of powerful national commercial interests in the Arctic and identified this as the new cold war front.

• A general outline of the origins of the SUN Ark, from inside the construction sector by Jerzy Kasperowicz, MD of the company. He emphasized his personal belief in renewable energy and experiences visiting refugee camps where power is so essential for a decent life and where the conditions for it are so abysmal. He showed the transformational capacity of stable energy flows and the multifaceted capability of his easy to ship and assemble “sun wedges” to serve as generating, pumping, sheltering facilities. He also talked about the SUN program and the commitment to play his part in delivering a new kind of community support system for Green Growth & travelism.

• Finally the event closed with two “community perspectives” A fascinating description by Pankaj Pradhananga of life in Nepal after the horrendous earthquake and the action taken by the travel community to restore the decimated market. He underscored the fact that the main attraction and trekking routes had been largely unaffected but that popular wisdom was the whole of the country was in disarray. He showed a video that several local industry operators had produced showing the realities and calling for support for their actions. Followed by an equally illuminating view by Vallere Tjolle of his lifetime love affair with the food and culture of Romagna and the incredible unexplored ecotourism opportunities inland from the overcrowded beach resorts.

In drawing the evening to a close, Geoffrey Lipman thanked all the presenters, as well as Koen Vanmechelen for his generous provision of the facilities. He said that the shared view of a more caring, inclusionary and low carbon world epitomized the vision and spirit of Maurice Strong. He said that he would visit him in the coming days and share the success of the Reflections Session.

Footnotes:

1 – See uhasselt.be/GGTsummerschool

2 – Dr Ignace Schops (Biodiversity & Climate Change); Felix Dodds (UN System and Multi-stakeholders); Professor Harold Goodwin (Responsible & Pro Poor Tourism); Professor Geert Wets (Sustainable Mobility); Professor Geoffrey Lipman (Green Growth & Travelism); Dr Rebecca Hawkins (Corporate CSR); Tom Goldberg MBE (SUN ARK); Dr Roger Carter (Community Transformation); Professor Michael McGrath (Decision Support Modelling); Marcel Henry ( Data Integration and Mobiles); Valere Tjolle (Ecotourism Sustainability); Ulrich Schulte-Strathouse (Global Aviation