Project status

In a first step, literature which is subject of the current scientific discourse was collected and categorized. In addition to national and international best practice examples for the certification of the sustainability of travel packages or travel components, assessment models from the travel industry were examined and evaluated.  Based on this review, an overview of the current certifications for the individual travel components could be created. It became clear once again that the assessment of the sustainability of holiday trips has hardly been taken into account so far due to the complexity of the assessment. A recognised model does not exist. The focus is still on business certification and the fields of accommodation and destination. A detailed overview of all indicators that need to be taken into account when assessing the sustainability of travel chains was prepared. The first step was to record all indicators that could potentially be included in the final evaluation.
In a next step, the findings from secondary research were complemented by discussions with representatives from the industry. Due to the restrictions imposed by the Corona pandemic, the first practice partner meetings for the project were held digitally. The practice partners are members of the forum anders reisen e.V.

In the period from 27.05.2020 - 22.07.2020, five online workshops were held, which dealt with the following topics:

  • 27.05.2020 - Components of the travel chain
  • 10.06.2020 - Selection of criteria
  • 24.06.2020 - Discussion of criteria and sources
  • 08.07.2020 - Discussion of the criteria and exclusion criteria
  • 22.07.2020 - Model development and consumer communication

In the online workshops, the large number of travel components to be considered and the selection of potential criteria for the sustainability assessment of the travel chain were discussed. An open exchange with the industry partners was facilitated with the help of interactive tools. These participatory formats enable the collection of important information from the industry and can illustrate trends for prioritising individual travel components in the evaluation model.
From 18.06.20 - 30.06.20 the participants of the association forum anders reisen e.V. had the opportunity to take part in an online survey, in which individual criteria and indicators could be evaluated according to their importance based on the travel chain. The last online workshop dealt in detail with model development and potential forms of delivering information in the form of a label.
All conferences were recorded and are available for interested partners. The PowerPoint presentations of the individual sessions are available for download here.

In recent months, the project team further developed and refined the evaluation model for assessing the sustainability of travel packages. In the process, the results of the workshops, the survey and further considerations were incorporated into the conceptual design of the model.

On December 2nd, 2020, another digital project conference was held. The aim of the event was to present the project to a broader public, which included representatives from politics, business, academia and tourism associations/organizations. Following this event, further discussions with experts will be held in the coming months and the model will be refined further and tested with industry partners.

The following figure illustrates the planned approach for the development of the model. For an English version of the illustration please contact the project team.

Conceptual design of the evaluation model ©Leuphana Universität Lüneburg
Conceptual design of the evaluation model