INTHEBLACK May 2025 - Magazine - Page 46
F E AT U R E
“We’re doing a once-in-a-generation upgrade of our
airfield that involves milling the asphalt on the runway.
Instead of just sending that to landfill, we’re using it
to construct our new car parks — that’s 27,000 tonnes
of asphalt being recycled. These sorts of initiatives lead
to good economic and environmental outcomes.”
KATE GILLIES CPA, HOBART AIRPORT
compromised tourist destinations could risk
up to 176,000 jobs in Australia, 65 per cent
of which are outside capital cities.
While the research is Australia-specific,
Triggs says the implications of climate
change could be even worse for developing
countries where tourism is “more heavily
weighted” to highly vulnerable natural
wonders such as beaches.
A VULNERABLE POSITION
A growing number of Asia-Pacific’s famous
tourism sites and destinations are exposed
to climate risk — coral bleaching on
Australia’s Greater Barrier Reef, increasingly
devastating typhoons in South-East Asia
that have ravaged Vietnam and the
Philippines in recent years, and rising sea
levels that are threatening Bangladesh’s
low-lying historical Bagerhat mosques.
In the Pacific, a World Meteorological
Organization report states that a “triple
whammy” of sea-level rises, ocean warming
and acidification is putting islands in peril
and threatening the socioeconomic viability
of people who rely on tourism to live.
Randy Durband, CEO of the Global
Sustainable Tourism Council, says a tourism
industry that relies on stable and predictable
environmental conditions is “extremely
vulnerable” to the forces of climate change,
which are causing more frequent and severe
weather events. He warns that short-term
thinking has resulted in too few nations
or tourism operators responding appropriately
to the threat. Instead, they may alter tourism
products, change destinations or simply say
to prospective tourists that people “can’t go
here anymore”. “I don’t think there’s been
enough adaptation at all,” Durband says.
With tourism forecast to comprise more
than 11 per cent of the Asia-Pacific economy
by 2034, a value of US$5.83 trillion, the
stakes are high to protect the industry.
For now, Triggs says climate change and
46 INTHEBLACK May 2025
its dampening effect on tourism is hurting
both the real economy and the financial
system in some South-East Asian nations.
“Tourism is a big source of employment
for so many people in Asia, so it really
impacts the real economy. But then
you’ve got this financial side whereby
a lot of South-East Asian countries rely
on tourism as their main source of
foreign exchange.”
The upshot is that they can then struggle
to fund crucial pillars of their economies.
FIGHT OR FLIGHT
Not only are priceless natural assets under
threat from climate change — crucial
infrastructure such as airports, scenic roads
and railways are also at risk of accessibility
issues, supply-chain disruption, adaptation
costs and reputational damage.
In Australia, Hobart Airport is the aviation
gateway for Tasmania’s highly regarded
tourism sector. CFO Kate Gillies CPA
and her team are determined to manage
transition risk and contribute to the
sustainability of the sector on two fronts.
First, the airport has a Climate Change
Adaptation Plan in place to help ensure
that its facility is as resilient as possible
and able to support tourism across the state.
Second, as part of the aviation sector, it wants
to do its best to reduce its own environmental
footprint and work with its partners to help
them do the same.
“We’re focused on embedding
sustainability in everything we do,”
Gillies says. “For example, we’re doing
a once-in-a-generation upgrade of our
airfield that involves milling the asphalt
on the runway. Instead of just sending that
to landfill, we’re using it to construct our
new car parks — that’s 27,000 tonnes
of asphalt being recycled. These sorts of
initiatives lead to good economic and
environmental outcomes.”
