UN tourism body urges uniformity in virus travel rules

The World Tourism Organization called Monday for the standardisation of traveller health checks and the establishment of air corridors to ease international travel during the pandemic.

The call came at a conference in Spain’s Canary Islands as the global tourism industry reels from a year in which travel restrictions to slow the coronavirus pandemic have decimated the sector.

“We call for the adoption of international protocols for Covid-19 tests before departure and the acceptance of the results upon arrival,” the UN body said in joint statement with the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) and the Spanish tourism ministry.

The statement came at the end of a one-day conference grouping representatives of more than 95 countries and more than 100 companies that was held in Las Palmas on Gran Canaria.

It also called for agreements to develop “international travel corridors to facilitate tourism and business travel between countries and cities with similar epidemiological situations”.

The text also warned that until a vaccine or treatment for Covid-19 was widely available, “tens of millions of jobs (in tourism) would likely be lost”.

And it called for “an international standard for contact tracing”.

Just over a month ago, the WTO said international tourists arrivals plunged by an annualised 70 percent during the first eight months of 2020 because of the pandemic.