"Safety recognitions, certifications and validations are now an essential part of communicating a destination and this situation is unlikely to change in the near future, despite the expected availability of a vaccine," said the director of the regional committee for Europe, Alessandra Priante, in an interview with the agency Efe.

The official, who will participate next week in the EURAGORA virtual forum, jointly organized by the agencies Efe and Lusa, considered that health and safety, as well as the state of the health system, are now "key elements" for any destination and are a crucial element in marketing plans.

In his opinion, tourism has proven to be the most resilient industry and has a unique ability to drive the recovery and development of societies.

The UNWTO believes that recovery should go hand in hand with pillars such as "sustainability and innovation, together with an appropriate use of data, which will have to become the new normal".

"The pandemic has been a learning experience, and the mistakes of the past must be avoided," he stressed.

Priante considered that "if low cost tourism means excessive tourism, then this should be avoided with a more conscious approach to tourist flows, which must be managed through the use of data in an innovative and sustainable way".

The UNWTO is supporting countries in their efforts to restart tourism and, in this work, representatives of the high body recently visited Italy and the Canary Islands to send a clear message that it is safe to travel again when all necessary precautions are taken ” .

The Portuguese and Spanish news agencies, Lusa and Efe, will debate the impact of the covid-19 pandemic on Tourism, in a joint virtual forum, EURAGORA, financed by the European pilot project Stars4Media, which aims to support innovation in the sector of media, through training and cross-border cooperation within the European Union.

The debates - which will be broadcast on the 15th and 16th of July, through a joint online platform and the social networks of both agencies - are the result of an unprecedented partnership between Lusa and Efe and will bring together international organizations, European commissioners, regional and local ministers and officials from both countries, and associations in the tourism and consumer sectors.

The approach to the theme is based on two main topics: "Security, what do consumers expect, how do industry, governments, the European Union respond?" (July 15th, at 10:00 am in Lisbon, here https://youtu.be/oXm5alG0mp4) and “Reinvention and opportunities: sun and beach / urban and cultural / rural tourism” (July 16th, at 10: 00 from Lisbon, here https://youtu.be/unA38PYTa5g).