The study took into account all types of short term travel, including those travelling for conferences and incentives and other corporate travellers.
The research looked at emissions growth in the visitor economy in 175 countries between 2009 and 2019 and found an increase in carbon emissions of 3.5 per cent per year in the visitor economy compared to a growth rate of 1.5 per cent a year across the whole economy.
The carbon emissions generated through short term travel and the visitor economy accounts for nine per cent of global emissions.
“Without urgent interventions in the global tourism industry, we anticipate annual increases in emissions of three to four per cent meaning they will double every 20 years,” said Associate Professor Ya-Yen Sun at the University of Queensland’s Business School who was one of the authors of the work.
“This does not comply with the Paris Agreement which requires the sector to reduce its emissions by more than 10 per cent annually.
“The major drivers behind the increasing emissions are slow technology improvements and a rapid growth in demand.
“The biggest carbon challenge in tourism is air travel,” Sun said.
“Reducing long-haul flights is one of the recommendations we’ve put forward to help the industry lower its emissions, along with targeted measures such as carbon dioxide taxes, carbon budgets and alternative fuel obligations.
“Cutting back on marketing long-haul travel and identifying a national growth threshold would also help rein in the rapid expansion of emissions.
“At a local level, tourism operators could look to renewable electricity for accommodation, food and recreational activities and switch to electric vehicles for transport.
“In Australia, if businesses select an electricity plan based on renewables rather than coal, they’ll be reducing their emissions.”
While the USA, China and India were collectively responsible for 60 per cent of the increase in emissions over the decade studied, Australia was ranked within the top 20 countries that together contributed 75 per cent of the carbon footprint of the 175 countries whose data was analysed in the research.
Aside from the University of Queensland, researchers for the study came from Griffith University, the University of Sydney and Linnaeus University in Sweden.
