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Date: 09 Nov 2022
Category: Climate and biodiversity
The annual GDS Index is a world-leading sustainability benchmarking and performance improvement programme for destinations and their visitor economies, announced the 2022 results today (Wednesday 9th November) that sees the Northern Ireland capital climb eleven places since last year to take the 8th spot; placing Belfast as the most sustainable destination in the Island of Ireland.
Clearly demonstrating a focus to build the sector back from the impacts of the Covid pandemic and bringing sustainability to the forefront of tourism growth and development, Belfast achieved a score of 84.01 per cent, up 13 percentage points from last year when Belfast ranked 19th out of 73 destinations.
Reflecting on just how far Belfast has come and congratulating the combined efforts of those involved in tourism, conference and events sales, promotion and development, the Lord Mayor of Belfast Councillor Tina Black said:
“It’s hugely important to see Belfast rank among the greenest and most sustainable destinations in the world. Global research has highlighted the need for to protect our built and natural environment and provide destination stewardship. By aligning these and the needs of our community we can lay the foundations for building a stronger, more resilient tourism sector in the coming decades.
“I’m extremely proud that our combined efforts with key businesses and organisations across the city, from the public, private and civic sectors are keeping our city on the global stage, clearly setting out our qualities as an appealing, attractive, responsible tourism destination. I think this success demonstrates what can be achieved when we work together; this is a really good news story for Belfast.”
The GDS-Index focusses on much more than environmental sustainability, challenging destinations to collectively rethink what successful tourism destinations should look like, and as a sector, demonstrate how tourism can and is a force for good, contributing not just economically but societally and environmentally to its host city-place.
Recognising sustainable leaders within the global leisure and business tourism sector at the 61st International Congress and Convention Association conference in Poland, the GDS-Index assesses destination performance across 73 criteria over four key areas: environmental strategy and infrastructure, social sustainability, industry sustainability and destination management performance by Visit Belfast.
Comparing data submitted by 65 destinations, the results offer insights into the trends and progress of the global destinations’ commitment to transforming their social, environmental and destination management practices. Other leading cities to make the Top 10 include Gothenburg, Bordeaux, Stockholm, Copenhagen, and Glasgow.
Belfast’s ranking represents a significant milestone for the city, underpinning Belfast City Council’s vision set out in the Belfast Resilience Strategy that aims to see the Belfast City Region transition to an inclusive, zero-emissions climate resilient economy within a generation.
A major part of this strategy includes Belfast’s One Million Trees project. This initiative is a joint pledge between Belfast City Council, private and voluntary sectors to plant one million native trees across the city by 2035.
Improving Belfast’s tourism and hospitality industry’s sustainability credentials has been key to the city’s success, helping it to climb from 47th position to a top ten position in just two years. In June 2021, Visit Belfast and Belfast City Council launched the world’s largest-ever green tourism city partnership - over two-thirds of the city’s hotel stock is now sustainability certified. Belfast has also achieved several ‘green tourism’ firsts in the process: ICC Belfast became the first Green Meeting certified venue on the island of Ireland, Queen's University Belfast became the first organisation on the island of Ireland to be given a Green Meetings Gold Award and Titanic Belfast was recognised as a leader in sustainability by receiving Silver Awards for the Green Tourism and Green Meetings accreditations.