United Nations World Tourism Organization

The World Tourism Organization (UN Tourism) is the United Nations agency promoting responsible, sustainable, and universally accessible tourism.

As the leading international organization in tourism, UN Tourism promotes tourism as a driver of economic growth, inclusive development, and environmental sustainability. It offers leadership and support to the sector in advancing knowledge and tourism policies worldwide.

Priorities

Mainstreaming tourism in the global agenda: Advocating the value of tourism as a driver of socio-economic growth and development, its inclusion as a priority in national and international policies, and the need to create a level playing field for the sector to develop and prosper.

Promoting sustainable tourism development: Supporting sustainable tourism policies and practices: policies which make optimal use of environmental resources, respect the socio-cultural authenticity of host communities, and provide socio-economic benefits for all.

They are fostering knowledge, education, and capacity building, Supporting countries in assessing and addressing their needs in education and training and providing networks for knowledge creation and exchange.

Improving tourism competitiveness: Improving UN Tourism Members’ competitiveness through knowledge creation and exchange, human resources development, and promoting excellence in policy planning, statistics and market trends, sustainable tourism development, marketing and promotion, product development, and risk and crisis management.

Advancing tourism’s contribution to poverty reduction and development: Maximizing the contribution of tourism to poverty reduction and achieving the SDGs by making tourism work as a tool for growth and promoting the inclusion of tourism in the development agenda.

Building partnerships: Engaging with the private sector, regional and local tourism organizations, academia and research institutions, civil society, and the UN system to build a more sustainable, responsible, and competitive tourism sector.

Our Structure

Members: An intergovernmental organization, UN Tourism has 160 Member States, 6 Associate Members, 2 Observers, and over 500 Affiliate Members.

Organs: The General Assembly is the supreme organ of the Organization. In consultation with the Secretary-General, the Executive Council takes all measures to implement the decisions and recommendations of the General Assembly and reports to the Assembly.

Secretariat: UN Tourism headquarters are based in Madrid, Spain. The Secretary-General leads the Secretariat and is organized into departments covering sustainability, education, tourism trends and marketing, sustainable development, statistics and the Tourism Satellite Account (TSA), destination management, ethics, and risk and crisis management. The Technical Cooperation and Silk Road Department carries out development projects in over 100 countries worldwide. At the same time, the Regional Departments for Africa, the Americas, Asia and the Pacific, Europe, and the Middle East are the link between UN Tourism and its 160 Member States. The Affiliate Members Department represents UN Tourism’s 500-plus Affiliate members.