Sign up to access the complete lesson and track your progress!
Unlock This CourseEvery tourist generates waste. From the plastic bottle bought at the airport to the uneaten buffet breakfast at a hotel, tourism produces enormous amounts of rubbish. Globally, the tourism industry contributes hundreds of millions of tonnes of solid waste every year and in popular destinations, this can completely overwhelm local waste systems.
Managing this waste is one of the most practical and visible ways that destinations can combat climate change. When waste ends up in landfill, it produces methane a greenhouse gas far more potent than CO₂. Recycling and reducing waste cuts emissions, saves resources and keeps destinations attractive for visitors.
Key Definitions:
A single cruise ship can generate over 8 tonnes of solid waste per day. That's the same as the rubbish produced by a small town all from one vessel at sea. Managing this waste responsibly is a massive challenge for the cruise industry.
Tourists tend to consume more than they would at home. They eat out more, buy more souvenirs, use more toiletries and often stay in hotels that provide single-use items like shampoo bottles, plastic cups and individually wrapped biscuits. Popular destinations can see their waste output multiply dramatically during peak season.
Hotels are among the biggest waste producers in tourism. They generate food waste from restaurants and buffets, packaging waste from supplies and single-use plastic from toiletries and room amenities. A large resort hotel can produce several tonnes of waste every single day.
Airports and airlines generate huge quantities of waste from food packaging, plastic cutlery, duty-free bags and in-flight meals. Many airlines still serve food in single-use plastic trays, though some are beginning to switch to compostable alternatives.
Theme parks, festivals and tourist attractions generate large amounts of waste from food stalls, gift shops and visitor facilities. A single music festival can leave behind hundreds of tonnes of rubbish, including abandoned tents, clothing and food packaging.
Beaches, national parks and natural attractions suffer from litter left by visitors. Plastic waste in particular is devastating for marine and wildlife ecosystems. Even biodegradable items like food scraps can disrupt local wildlife if left in the wrong places.
The most effective approach to waste management follows a clear priority order often called the waste hierarchy. The best option is always to create less waste in the first place. If waste is unavoidable, reuse is better than recycling. Recycling is better than sending things to landfill.
The most powerful option. Use fewer resources from the start. Examples: removing miniature plastic toiletry bottles from hotel rooms, serving food in smaller portions to cut food waste, using digital tickets instead of paper ones.
Use items multiple times before disposal. Examples: refillable water stations in hotels, reusable shopping bags in gift shops, returnable glass bottles in resort restaurants, linen reuse programmes in hotels.
Process used materials into new products. Examples: glass bottle collection at resorts, paper recycling in hotel offices, aluminium can recycling at attractions. Recycling is better than landfill but uses energy, so it's the last resort.
Where: Sweden, Norway, Denmark and Finland
What they did: Scandic Hotels is one of Europe's most sustainable hotel chains. They removed all single-use plastic from their rooms and restaurants, replacing miniature shampoo bottles with large refillable dispensers. They introduced food waste tracking technology in all their restaurants to measure exactly how much food was being thrown away and then used that data to reduce portion sizes and adjust ordering. By 2022, Scandic had cut food waste by over 30% across their hotels.
Other measures: Guests are encouraged to reuse towels and bed linen. Soap bars are collected and recycled into new soap through a partnership with a charity. Cardboard, glass and food waste are all separated for recycling or composting.
Result: Scandic has become a benchmark for sustainable hotel management in Europe, showing that reducing waste also saves money a win for the environment and the business.
Destinations use a wide range of strategies to tackle waste. These can be split into approaches aimed at businesses, tourists and governments.
Hotels, restaurants and attractions can take direct action to reduce the waste they produce and manage it more responsibly.
Where: Baa Atoll, Maldives
The challenge: The Maldives is a remote island nation with very limited space for waste disposal. Sending waste to landfill on a small island is catastrophic for the environment and the Maldives is already highly vulnerable to climate change and rising sea levels.
What Soneva Fushi did: This luxury eco-resort built its own on-site waste management facility called "Mr Trash Wheel" a waste-to-resource centre. All waste produced by the resort is sorted, recycled or repurposed on site. Glass bottles are crushed and turned into sand for construction. Organic waste is composted and used in the resort's own vegetable garden. Metal is collected and sent to recycling facilities on the mainland.
Single-use plastics: Soneva Fushi banned all single-use plastics across the resort. Guests are given reusable water bottles on arrival and all packaging used in the resort is either biodegradable or recyclable.
Result: The resort diverts over 90% of its waste away from landfill. It has become a model for sustainable resort management in small island destinations worldwide.
Individual businesses can only do so much. Governments and destination management organisations (DMOs) play a crucial role in setting rules, providing infrastructure and encouraging good behaviour across the whole destination.
Governments can ban single-use plastics outright, making it illegal to sell or use them. The EU banned many single-use plastic items in 2021, including plates, cutlery, straws and cotton buds. This directly affects tourism businesses operating in Europe.
Tourists pay a small deposit on drinks bottles or cans and get it back when they return the container for recycling. This dramatically increases recycling rates. Germany's system (called Pfand) achieves a 98% return rate for bottles one of the highest in the world.
Where: Rwanda, East Africa
What happened: In 2008, Rwanda became one of the first countries in the world to completely ban plastic bags. Visitors arriving at Kigali International Airport have their bags searched and any plastic bags are confiscated. The ban applies to everyone tourists and residents alike.
Why it matters for tourism: Rwanda is a major ecotourism destination, famous for mountain gorilla trekking in Volcanoes National Park. Keeping the country clean and green is essential for maintaining its reputation as a premium, sustainable destination. Tourists visiting Rwanda are immediately struck by how clean and litter-free the country is compared to many other destinations.
Result: Rwanda is now widely regarded as one of the cleanest countries in Africa. The plastic bag ban has been credited with significantly reducing litter and plastic pollution in rivers, lakes and natural areas. It has become a model for other African nations.
Reducing waste cuts costs for businesses. Recycling conserves natural resources. Bans on single-use plastics produce immediate, measurable results. Waste reduction improves the visual appeal of destinations, maintaining tourist satisfaction.
Setting up recycling infrastructure is expensive, especially in remote or island destinations. Tourists may not follow waste rules if they are not clearly explained. Some recycling processes still use significant energy. Enforcement of bans can be difficult in large or busy destinations.
Businesses may resist changes if they increase costs. Local communities may lack the infrastructure to handle tourist-generated waste. In developing countries, waste management systems may be underfunded, making sustainable tourism harder to achieve.
Sustainable waste management isn't just the responsibility of businesses and governments tourists themselves have a key role to play. Responsible tourist behaviour can make a significant difference, especially in fragile or remote destinations.
Where: Somerset, England
The challenge: Glastonbury is one of the world's most famous music festivals, attracting around 200,000 visitors each year. In the past, the festival generated enormous amounts of waste including thousands of abandoned tents, sleeping bags and single-use cups left behind by departing festival-goers.
What they did: Glastonbury introduced a reusable cup scheme visitors pay a deposit on a reusable cup and get it back when they return it. This dramatically cut the number of plastic cups going to landfill. The festival also banned single-use plastic bottles in 2019, installing hundreds of free water refill points across the site. Volunteers run a Love the Farm, Leave No Trace campaign, encouraging visitors to take their rubbish home or use the recycling stations provided.
Result: The reusable cup scheme alone prevented an estimated 1.3 million plastic cups from going to landfill in a single year. Glastonbury has become a leader in sustainable event management and is frequently cited as an example of how large events can reduce their environmental impact.
In the exam, you may be asked to evaluate strategies for managing waste sustainably. Always try to:
Managing waste sustainably is one of the most practical and visible ways that tourism destinations can combat climate change. From luxury eco-resorts in the Maldives to music festivals in Somerset, the most successful approaches combine reducing waste at source, encouraging reuse and making recycling easy and accessible. When businesses, governments and tourists all play their part, the results can be dramatic cleaner destinations, lower emissions and a tourism industry that future generations can still enjoy.