TICOS response to the UK government climate change agenda
Since TICOS was announced by the tourism industry associations in November 2006, a number of government interventions have necessitated that we respond to take account of the ever changing circumstances in which we find ourselves. We have outlined below the main issues that we have to deal with and our response.
- The doubling of Air Passenger Duty (APD), without any hypothecation of the money raised for either carbon reduction or other environmental programmes, has caused significant annoyance and a number of operators have put on hold their offset plans whilst they consider the implications of the APD timetable. Although the UK Government Office for Climate Change have made it clear that the decision to raise APD is not connected with their work, the timing was particularly unfortunate.
- The UK government has decided to go ahead with a new consultation process with a view to establishing a national offset policy, probably with some form of kite mark or logo. This consultation starts in mid January 2007 and is unlikely to report before next autumn at the earliest. The scale and scope of what the government intends to do may be inappropriate for many operators as it only applies to countries who are signatory to the Kyoto agreement. It will not therefore cover some of the destinations visited by tour operator customers.
- The UK Government's Environmental Audit Committee has launched an inquiry into the voluntary carbon offset market because of the growing concerns about how it operates at present.
- The European Trading Emission Programme will be extended to include aviation within Europe in 2011 and internationally in 2012. Action is necessary in the meantime.
We recognise that many operators are very keen to commence a carbon offset programme as soon as they can and others are looking at existing programmes they support. In order to avoid any discontinuity caused by the government and European timetables, we will commit to help any tour operator using the TICOS service to establish a new carbon offset programme which we can then adapt to any changes caused by legislation or regulation.
As an interim measure we will also help any tour operator who has entered into an agreement with an existing offset company to renegotiate their current arrangement to meet our own rigorous standards. In that way we can make sure that what the audit committee describes as "growing concerns about the carbon offset market" are properly addressed by our team of advisors.
All new programmes we help to arrange will use the same standards and same carbon calculations, thus overcoming one of the main problems in lack of consistency in the figures used by the forty or so offset provider businesses currently offering their services. Where we are asked to deal with existing providers we will seek to ensure that they comply with our standards and use our common figures. We are committed to the principle that carbon offset service costs and overheads are kept to a maximum of twenty percent over a five year period. If your current provider is charging you more than this then we will happily help you to renegotiate your contract or to incorporate you into the TICOS programme.
At the same time we will continue to improve the TICOS service and to formalise our links with UNESCO, IUCN, UNDP and the Travel Foundation to identify and develop high quality carbon offset projects in tourism destinations around the World. We are already working on over 40 expressions of interest from over 30 different countries.
We fully understand that in this short message we cannot deal with all of the questions you may have. The TICOS website contains a lot more information and we are happy to talk through with any tour operator their specific needs and concerns on either an informal or in confidence basis.
This is really quite a fast changing scenario. The industry associations and the TICOS team have their respective fingers firmly on the pulse and we are confident that the advice and help we are able to offer is the best available.
Dick Sisman, January 2007
TICOS Management team