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4 Feb, 2016

Flashback 1988: Former UNWTO chief Willibald Pahr’s India speech on Tourism, Passport to Peace & Development

Bangkok – The first time that I heard the connection being made between Tourism, Peace & Development was in this speech by the late UN World Tourism Organisation Secretary-General Dr Willibald Pahr at a conference organised by the Indian Institute of Tourism and Management in New Delhi on February 22, 1988.

Along with thousands of other documents, speeches, studies, reports and briefings collected over the years, I retained this speech in my archives and am now reproducing it for the benefit of the emerging generation of tourism executives, staffers and leaders.

In the 27 years since this speech was delivered, has tourism actually distinguished itself as a Passport to Peace & Development? If not, why not? What went wrong? Who should be held accountable? And what can still be done to make that original aspiration and dream come true?

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Click on the image to download the full text of the speech.