MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

World Tourism Day, September 27, this year is celebrated in New Delhi

The following is the message from Prahlad Singh Patel, Minister of State (IC) for Tourism & Culture, Government of India. India is pleased to host the official celebrations of United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) World Tourism Day in New Delhi.

The theme of this year’s World Tourism Day ‘Tourism and Jobs: A better Future for All’ is highly appropriate as tourism is extremely labor intensive and significant source of employment for many global economies.

Tourism is one such activity which extends to various other sectors and thus is responsible for creating direct and indirect employment requiring varying degrees of skills and allows for quick entry into the workforce for youth, women and poor. The tourism sector therefore is not only an engine for economic growth but also an effective tool for poverty alleviation among the marginalized segments of the society.

We believe that development of tourism is directly linked with community development. We want the local population to benefit by the development of tourism in their region and for this we should focus on development of soft skills among the locals.

In the process of job creation, let us ensure that our strategies for development of tourism are not in conflict with the environment and have minimal negative impact. When we talk about sustainability we should not only talk about conservation of resources but also our culture and heritage, which we have adopted in India through our Sustainable Tourism Criteria.

On behalf of the Ministry of Tourism, I would like to express my gratitude to UNWTO for choosing India as the host for this year’s World Tourism Day I am hopeful that together with the experts from tourism field, we will be able to highlight the challenges and opportunities of employment in Tourism sector and find solutions to the issues of employments in Tourism.