The World Indigenous Tourism Alliance (WINTA) and the Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA) have agreed to develop plans and programs to give practical expression, through tourism, to Indigenous rights.
Guiding principles will be taken from the relevant portions of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
This agreement follows their common focus in fostering tourism developments consistent with the principles of the Larrakia Declaration that were promulgated on March 30, 2012 at the Pacific Asia Indigenous Tourism Conference 2012 in Darwin, Australia. The Larrakia Declaration has also been supported by the United Nations World Tourism Organization.
In the history of tourism development, human rights violations have been a frequently raised issue, denounced by human rights advocacy groups, trade unions and other civil society organisations. Indigenous peoples have often been the victims of such human rights violations.
The collaboration by WINTA and PATA represents an important step by the tourism industry to apply an industry perspective to the watershed development work undertaken by the UN Global Compact, the largest voluntary corporate responsibility initiative in the world, in the production of the Business Reference Guide: United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. The Guide was prepared by the UN Global Compact to help businesses understand, respect, and supports the rights of indigenous peoples by illustrating how these rights are relevant to business activities
WINTA and PATA intend to agree on priority projects for promotion and implementation in the Asia Pacific region from 2014 forward.
