Filling a Critical Gap in the SDGs Monitoring
Tourism can support the achievement of the United Nations’ 2030 Agenda, being explicitly mentioned in Goal 8 on economic growth and decent work, Goal 12 on sustainable consumption and production and Goal 14 on the sustainable use of oceans.
Particularly with respect to the promotion of sustainable tourism that creates jobs (Target 8.9), global monitoring has largely focused on tourism’s economic contribution, through the indicator “Tourism Direct GDP”. The new dataset, launched in partnership with the International Labour Organization (ILO), fills a critical data gap on tourism’s role as an employment generator worldwide and in a more sustainable future.
The dataset harmonizes, and builds on, both organization’s official data compilation from countries and derives from the UN-endorsed Statistical Framework for Measuring the Sustainability of Tourism.
The new dataset corresponds to the indicator “employed persons in the tourism industries” approved by the United Nations Inter-agency and Expert Group on Sustainable Development Goal Indicators (IAEG-SDGs) at its 15th Meeting in Oslo, Norway. This is the result of a proposal put forward by Austria and Spain (as co-chairs of the UN Tourism Committee on Statistics), Saudi Arabia (as Vice-Chair of the UN Tourism Committee on Statistics), CARICOM, ILO and UN Tourism as part of the 2025 Comprehensive Review of the Global Indicator Framework for the SDGs.
A First in Tourism Data
For the first time, this dataset offers new and more comprehensive insights into tourism employment and key characteristics of persons employed in tourism:
- PRPBy sex: male/female
- PRPBy status in employment: employees and self-employed
- PRPFor the 10 tourism industries: accommodation, food & beverage serving activities, passenger transport in its various forms (air, water, railway, road), transport equipment rental, travel agencies, cultural activities, and sports and recreational activities.
Data is accessible in the Sustainable Development Goals section of the UN Tourism Statistics Database, and can support analytical insights into tourism’s employment, supporting tourism policies and decision-making with respect to issues like social development, employment creation and decent work strategies, economic diversification or poverty reduction.
As well as empowering tourism stakeholders, the new data also provides useful insights for ministries of employment, social affairs, economic and industry affairs, worker representatives, private sector and academic researchers—streamlining tourism into global, national and local agendas.
Tags: Sustainable Development Goals, UN Tourism
