The Ciclovía Maya, the world’s largest tourist bikeway, will connect and integrate the economic activities of dozens of local communities in Mexico‘s Yucatan peninsula.

This initiative will promote sustainable mobility and «zero-emissions tourism,» noted the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in a report.

Ciclovía Maya

Why the notoriety? Creating a more sustainable and competitive tourism offer requires investment in public infrastructure.

Mexico has taken a proactive approach by developing tourism bikeways to connect local communities and allow visitors to travel to natural and cultural destinations.

On the other hand, linked to tourism, the OECD indicated that facilitating knowledge transfer and access to data (e.g., sea level rise and flood maps), creating business tools (e.g., calculating the financial implications of climate risks), and implementing preventive actions are areas where government can play a role.

In Mexico, the ADAPTUR project aims to support the tourism sector in climate adaptation and strengthen business capacity to undertake concrete actions, such as economic risk assessments for the hotel sector and real estate projects, and the involvement of tourism in the restoration and protection of mangroves and coral reefs.

Tourism

Many countries recognize the need to upgrade and modernize products and develop destinations to meet the changing expectations of tourists and are taking steps to address this.

In Canada, for example, the Tourism Assistance Fund provides funding for product and destination development.

Spain has introduced a €720 million package for tourism, with €565 million to fund projects that improve innovation and competitiveness through greater use of digital technologies, energy efficiency and sustainable practices.

In 2022, Chile committed 18 million Chilean pesos to promote participation in international tourism investment events, disseminate sector opportunities in priority markets and improve information for investment decision-making.

A commitment of this agreement and of the Action Plan for the Attraction of Tourism Investment 2020-25 is the creation of an international agenda that will consider the development of international tours and round tables with investors and sector workshops, among other activities.