Call for unified EU tourism strategy

Date: 07/03/1996

IT accounts for one in eight jobs in the European Union, and generates almost 1,000 billion ecu in revenue each year - and yet tourism as an EU policy barely exists.

Totally neglected until the Eighties, its history since then has been chequered to say the least.

The much-vaunted 'European Year of Tourism', a 4-million-ecu event designed to raise awareness of the industry, ended in acrimony after MEPs accused the Commission of profligacy and incompetence.

Recriminations notwithstanding, the Commission pressed ahead with plans to promote Europe as a travel destination, setting up a revamped tourism unit, complete with a small staff and an even smaller budget. But it too fell into disrepute when tales of alleged fraud and bribery within the unit's ranks hit newspapers in 1985.

Two senior Commission officials were dismissed, the Belgian police called in, and the tourism unit's image further tarnished.

But all has not been doom and gloom in DGXXIII, the Directorate-General for enterprise policy, distributive trades and cooperatives as well as tourism. Most industry experts agree that, given the limited resources accorded it, the department has not, in fact, fared badly.

Promotional programmes to encourage Americans to return to their roots, art lovers to visit Europe's galleries and blind people to frequent museums, are among the innovative schemes it can boast.

However, despite its noble efforts, the unit has failed, say tourism experts, to represent their interests adequately within the Commission, or to promote their business in the world at large, a failure which has given rise to anger and frustration.

Pointing to the decision not to grant the unit any money to spend on new initiatives in 1996, they argue that tourism does not box its weight in EU circles.

“The tourism unit has a role to play, but let us face it, it was tagged on as an afterthought to DGXXIII, and it continues to be an outsider with very little power,” explains a representative from the European Travel Commission (ETC), an association which represents national tourist authorities.

And while many have argued in the past that tourism should be left to national governments, they are now changing their minds. The steady decline in Europe's share of the world tourism market has convinced most of the 15 member states that they need to pull together.

Tourism Commissioner Christos Papoutsis summed up the mood change at a recent conference in

Milan. “Europe's exposure to stiff competition in the market-place is reinforcing the need to pool resources for increasing the attractiveness and visibility of European travel products,” he said.

There are two reasons why many believe that a genuine European tourism strategy is needed.

The first is, quite simply, because tourism is a cross-border business. “Europe exists as a concept in the minds of overseas travellers from, for example, America, Asia and Australia, so we need to promote it as a single travel destination. Once they get to Europe, we can compete for their attention,” explains the ETC representative.

The second reason, which is perhaps more pressing, is that a large proportion of the legislation which has a direct impact on the travel industry is now adopted in Brussels. “Our business is a disparate one involving hotels, tour guides, planes and trains, and we desperately need to pull together all of these separate strands into one cohesive policy,” says Julie Kutner of the World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC), adding: “By extension, we are affected by environment, transport, consumer and other laws, and we need to ensure that we have a say in the drafting of those laws.”

The WTTC is among those organisations clamouring for the EU to do more to help the tourism industry. “Tourism is an extremely important European export and yet it is barely considered by the Commission. Without a doubt, its profile needs to be raised,” says Kutner.

Conscious of the growing dissatisfaction within the tourism industry, Papoutsis launched a Green Paper last year asking interested parties to comment on whether they thought the Commission should shut down its tourism unit, maintain the status quo, do more of the same kind of work, or more work of a different nature.

The response was overwhelmingly in favour of the third and fourth options. “There was a loud cry that more should be done,” said one Commission official. But he added: “There seems to be a mismatch between what is asked of us and what, in reality, we can deliver.”

Clearly changes have to be made. But a questionmark remains over what sort of changes these should be.

With the Intergovernmental Conference to review the Maastricht Treaty looming, Papoutsis has already launched a campaign to have tourism written into the new treaty. “A reference in the treaty on tourism policy could spell out Community objectives in the fields of tourism and cultural tourism,” he told the conference in Milan.

Papoutsis is not alone in his desire to win official status for tourism. The European Parliament has thrown itself behind the idea, as has a large section of the tourism industry, albeit cautiously.

The latter is worried that a beefed-up Commission unit would concentrate too heavily on law-making and not enough on policy-making.

“We do not want more legislation; in fact, we want less,” says Kutner, adding that excessive taxes and a surfeit of laws are already crippling the industry.

“We recognise the need for legislation, but we want it to be cost effective and absolutely necessary.”

Instead, the WTTC and other such organisations want the tourism unit to focus its effort on making sure their interests are taken into account when mainstream EU laws on, for example, transport or the environment, are being drafted.

“A mention in the treaty would boost the status of the tourism unit, and almost bind the other Commissioners to consult it when putting together legal proposals. No one is really obliged to check with them at the moment, they just do not have the clout,” says Kutner.

“If tourism is written into the treaty, then the other DGs may in time realise that this is not just a silly matter of sun and beaches, but an industry which generates billions of ecu a year.”

There is just one problem with Papoutsis' idea, however. Member states do not like it.

Given the fact that any changes to the EU treaties must be agreed unanimously by all EU governments, their lack of support is likely to make the proposal a non-starter, according to Edward McMillan-Scott, a UK Conservative MEP who headed the Parliament's tourism committee for a number of years.

Citing its history of mismanagement, he wants tourism taken out of the Commission's hands, and an independent tourism agency set up. “The EU needs to create a European agency for tourism which would be at arm's length from the Commission,” says McMillan-Scott.

Such an agency, which would be paid for by both the private sector and EU governments, would carry out studies, run surveys, market Europe as a destination and formulate tourism policy.

While McMillan-Scott's proposal was dismissed when first mooted a number of years ago, it is now becoming increasingly popular.

But it has one weakness. The agency would not be able to legislate, or to influence other European laws.

When EU leaders gather to contemplate the future of Europe's common foreign and security policy, enlargement and institutional reform, they will also spare at least one thought for tourism.

Exactly what they will decide is difficult to predict, but one thing is certain - changes are in store.