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Costa Rica was selected to host the World Congress on Social Tourism in October 2024, a decision taken unanimously by the Board of Directors of the Social Tourism Organization (ISTO), during a meeting held this morning in Brussels, Belgium.
The Costa Rican Tourism Institute (ICT) presented our country’s candidacy to the ISTO board of directors, which unanimously approved the holding of this event at the Costa Rica Convention Center, from October 23 to 25, 2024.
For Alberto López, general manager of ICT, “the decision to select Costa Rica as the venue for the Congress is based on an active participation since 2015, including having hosted the ‘Social Tourism Meeting of the Americas in 2019’, the year in which the ‘Social Tourism with Integrity of Costa Rica’ program was also launched. which this year evolved into a more robust program called ‘Tourism for All People’. We believe that ISTO has valued Costa Rica’s effort for almost a decade in understanding, applying, and evolving the concepts of social tourism to provide possibilities for populations with economic and physical limitations to enjoy the right to do tourism, as well as in the successful organization we had in 2019 of the ‘Social Tourism Meeting of the Americas’,” Lopez explained.
The World Congress on Social Tourism is held every two years and so far, twenty-eight editions have been held, of which five have been held in America, distributed as follows: two in Quebec and one in Montreal, Canada; another in Mexico City and Sao Paulo.
In 2024, the first will be held in Central America and only the second outside North America.
The last time it was held in the Americas was in Brazil in 2014 and it was precisely in this congress that Costa Rica had the first participation with the idea of evaluating the convenience of becoming an ISTO partner. The assessment was positive and since 2015, ICT has been an active partner of ISTO Americas and currently holds a position within the Board of Directors of ISTO Americas.
The World Congress on Social Tourism seeks to address the most relevant issues in the field, both to update the most recent trends and to learn about success stories in the presentation of programs that favor the possibility of exercising the right of all people to tourism.
At least 300 people from the three continents where ISTO has a presence are expected to attend the event in Costa Rica. A large number of representatives from the Americas are expected to participate, as well as Costa Rican organizations and companies, which are currently part of the “Tourism for All People” program.
The International Social Tourism Organization (ISTO) was founded in 1963 and is celebrating its 60th anniversary.
This organization bases its work on the thematic axes of accessibility, fair trade, environment, solidarity, and quality of life. In addition, it bases its objectives on “promoting the development of tourism for all and making holiday outings accessible to the greatest number of people (tourism for all) and on promoting and supporting tourism that is at the service of people, communities, and territories, and is identified with terms such as responsible tourism, solidarity, fairness or community (responsible tourism)”.
It has a presence in 46 countries and has 179 partner organizations, including ICT and three more in Costa Rica: UNED, Costa Rican Network of Accessible Tourism, and Funcavida Foundation.
Source: ICT
