10.18601/01207555.n29.15

EMPOWERING DESTINATIONS AFTER-COVID. BOOSTING CONFIDENCE THROUGH THE SDGS APPLICATION AND THE 'GLOCAL' DEVELOPMENT¹

EMPONDERANDO LOS DESTINOS EN ETAPA POS-COVID. RELANZANDO LA CONFIANZA POR MEDIO DE LA APLICACIÓN DE LOS ODS Y EL DESARROLLO 'GLOCAL'

JONATAN GÓMEZ PUNZÓN
Doctor interuniversitario en Turismo por la Universidad Rey Juan Carlos
Funcionario del enlace internacional de la UNWTO y director de la Plataforma de Turismo Sostenible de la UNWTO España
[jonatan.gomez@urjc.es]

¹ Para citar el artículo: Gómez, J. (2021). Empowering destinations after-COVID. Boosting confidence through the SDGs application and the 'glocal' development. Turismo y Sociedad, XXIX, pp. 333-347. DOI: https://doi.org/10.18601/01207555.n29.15

Fecha de recepción: 2 de septiembre de 2020
Fecha de modificación: 15 de enero de 2021
Fecha de aceptación: 22 de febrero de 2021.

Abstract

We are facing the most unexpected situation in the travel & tourism industry: An industry that has shut down due to closed borders and confinements of entire cities, etc. (Qiu et al., 2020). In this paper, we want to share a suitable (feasible) way to empower destinations after the crisis caused by COVID-19.

To be able to leave this stage of health safety and security crisis behind, an involved collaboration between all the stakeholders is imperative. This includes actors from the public sector to the smallest private tourism companies, and it involves local citizens as well as the different social collectives. This collaboration must be based on an atmosphere of common trust that creates the foundations for paradigm of global recovery thinking but acting at a local level. This, in turn must take inspiration and action from the application of the SDGs, not leaving anyone behind, neither tourism industry professionals nor the social movements born as a result of this pandemic. It is time for using this 'glocal' vision to strengthen destinations.

Keywords: COVID-19, tourism challenges, sustainable tourism, transformative tourism.

Resumen

Nos enfrentamos a la situación más inesperada en la industria de viajes y turismo: un cierre de la industria con fronteras cerradas, confinamientos de ciudades enteras, etc. (Qiu et al., 2020). En este trabajo queremos compartir una forma adecuada de empoderar a los destinos después de la crisis provocada por la COVID-19.

Para poder salir de esta etapa de crisis de seguridad y sanitaria, es realmente necesaria una colaboración profunda entre todos los actores, desde el sector público hasta la empresa privada turística, por muy pequeña que sea, e involucrar a los ciudadanos locales y a los diferentes colectivos sociales. Esta colaboración debe basarse en un clima de confianza común que cree las bases para la recuperación pensando en un paradigma global, pero actuando a nivel local. Esta colaboración debe, a su vez, inspirarse y actuar a partir la aplicación de los ODS, sin dejar a nadie atrás, ni a los profesionales del sector turístico ni a los movimientos sociales que han surgido a raíz de esta pandemia. Es hora de utilizar esta visión "glocal" para fortalecer los destinos.

Palabras clave: COVID-19, retos turísticos, turismo sostenible, turismo transformativo.

Introduction

COVID-19 effects have created a growing appreciation that enhancing the competitiveness and sustainability of the tourism sector through a strong process of collaboration between a wide range of organizations from the public sector, private sector and civil society will impact positively to those destinations and tourism businesses that have been affected by this sanitary crisis.

In times of COVID-19, the need for collaboration has become even more evident with a view to bringing all organizations in one line and joining forces to mitigate the impact of the crisis and accelerate recovery, and to build resilience of tourism enterprises to adapt their business models to the new reality (World Tourism Organization [UNWTO], 2018).

From the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, institutions that are directly and indirectly involved in the tourism sector need to collaborate actively for optimal tourism recovery. A clear activation framework with practical protocols will help tourism stakeholders to recover effectively, and these practices will be a useful tools to officials, politicians and public figures, who can play an active role in tourism crisis communication and speak publicly during the COVID-19 pandemic.

During the post-COVID-19 stage, public-private partnerships have needed to be strengthened for the recovery of tourism at all levels: from local to national and even intraregional level. At a local level, destination management organizations (DMOs) can play a leading role by bringing multiple stakeholders together to help coordinate and undertake joint actions for the promotion and management of tourism in the COVID-19 aftermath. At a national and intraregional level, there will be a need for joint initiatives involving national tourism administrations, tourism boards and tourism business associations to tackle the impact of the COVID-19 crisis and plan.

Tourism has always been a major job creator and has offered ample career opportunities to vulnerable groups, like women and youth. At the height of the COVID-19 crisis, all around the world employment was at risk, and tourism employees lost their jobs, which particularly affected the livelihoods of vulnerable groups of the society. Within the framework of tourism recovery initiatives, a new or updated tourism strategies to incorporate the SDGs within tourism planning, giving voice to social groups and new movements can help assess training needs, identify opportunities for local people to find employment and renew their career in the tourism sector, and propose actions to strengthen tourism education and training.

The COVID-19 aftermath will offer good opportunities to pay special attention to the use and diffusion of digital technologies in tourism human resources development activities. Specific initiatives can be developed to empower women to gain economic benefits from tourism development, also to train youth to obtain tourism employment and make career in the sector. At a local level, capacity building can be provided to communities in tourism destinations to develop, promote and manage tourism products in their area as a tool to diversify their income sources and help build sustainable livelihoods.

Theorical methodology

To evaluate the proposed decalogue, a comprehensive contrast has been made among the evolution of destination management methodologies when managing different crisis as a starting point, which is relevant but not time-relevant due to the novelty of the COVID-19 event. This research has been complemented with previous crisis interpretations from scientific authors, comparing reported statements about some different previously published research about the topic we are discussing about (Gibson, & Brown, 2009). The research framework was based on conducting an in-depth study of different sources available about the destination management theories, to develop a very solid compendium around the concept of an interpretive framework (Cuvardic García, 2001). This research will be complemented with an empirical description of different measures taken to strategically introduce the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) within the destination planification prior and during the COVID-19.

It is often pointed out that the best type of social-scientific management research in tourism is the one which "normatively" integrates the empirical research on tourism facts happening, without ignoring situations that can be also included through "regulatory validity", containing sources that reinforce the frameworks even if they happened, but weakening the research (Noguera, 2013), being perfectly acceptable by a global vision towards this article's research.

This is why to establish a solid building of an interpretive framework of potential useful crisis management strategies, the way of how destinations were managed during previous crisis must be taken into consideration when reflecting how COVID-19 is affecting these different situations. We cannot forget to mention destination management strategies which are based into a normative validity, as mentioned above, finding relationships in the final proposed decalogue to implement.

We can conclude that the strategies research which will drive us into the proposed decalogue is eminently qualitative and empirical since the interest in knowing the different strategies on crisis management arises as a result of the current situation of sanitary crisis and pandemic which is affecting the travel & tourism industry, concretely affecting the ongoing SDGs implementation strategies. This qualitative and empirical approach means that the destination strategies have gradually been focused on relevant concepts according to the evolution of the situation and the scope of study at any research (Hernández-Sampieri, & Mendoza, 2018). What is sought in a qualitative study like this is to obtain potential information (Hernández-Sampieri, & Mendoza, 2018). Thus, the ontological dimension of the research represents the author's view of what is happening, based on a set of different approaches (Vasilachis de Gialdino, 2009).

From the ontological perspective, this article will show us the existence of tourism destination strategies built through a great combination of variables inherent to different destinations, and how the different crises affect to them. This ontological dimension has been methodologically managed based on current empirical strategies applied to the development of the different Sustainable Development Goals in tourism.

The evolution of strategies and methodologies on strenghtening destinations. A theorical approach

Since decades ago, methodologies on destination planning suggested new models of planning based on multiple systems, mixing theory and planning based on empowering destinations (Getz, 1986). The evolution of the destination management methodologies moved forward and integrated sustainability issues into tourism policies and strategies facing unexpected issues affecting the destinations (Inskeep, 1994), focusing on resilience and economic crisis, and applying new technologies in tourism planning methodologies, helping destinations to investigate and incorporate future evaluative approaches to potential unexpected scenarios (Jiang et al., 2019), as those related with the implementation of the SDGs in tourism. In this regard, natural disasters and non-expected disasters were taken into consideration in the last decades when drafting destination planning strategies, providing speed and effectiveness of response to disaster, and the need to quickly repair destination image through disaster-management strategies (Mair et al., 2016). Regarding this new aspect to be considered, the early-stage of tourism-related crisis and disaster studies suggests that a dialogue between the tourism and the disaster prevention communities is necessary to implement new methodologies on tourism planning and destination management (Aliperti et al., 2019), in order to minimize the consequences of tourism hazards.

Coming into the current times, the tourism management theories and applications have included SDGs strategies from the early 21st century to the present, and it is even more necessary to keep them alive due to the pandemic effects. We can consider different strategies approach.

A first approach would be an important focus to business and profitability, influenced by the powerful effectiveness of the early stages of tourism, which has generated large revenues all around the tourism sector. A second and more current approach integrates sustainability facing the challenge of co-existing with the purpose of economic benefits but also focusing on stakeholder involvement and compartmentalized plans in sustainable tourism. Tourism planning knowledge is conveniently developed by pondering basic organizing concept but continues motivated by tourism industry concerns and shudders (World Tourism Organization [UNWTO] and United Nations Development Programme [UNDP], 2017).

From the previous early stages on planning methodologies to nowadays, we found lot of differences, as the mentioned incorporation of risk management or sustainability; but new methodologies on strengthening destinations are also currently incorporating key tools as technology. To have prompt access to smart information from different stakeholders facilitates the decision-making process when planning disaster recovery, and resilience from tourism destinations (Jovicic, 2019), and this is something destinations must take advantage of. Destinations which apply smart data management will be more prepared to give a prompt response to unexpected crisis and will be able to get concrete analysis of collected data when managing tourism destinations (Ivars-Baidal et al., 2019).

This combination of technology, sustainability and community-development or risk-management enhances the overall visitor experience, boosting the satisfaction and safety perception from the travelers, motivating them to travel to that concrete destination, since combined methodologies have been applied, and they are perceived by tourists, capturing the affective components of visitor experience (Godovykh, & Tasci, 2020). But this way to engage with tourists through implementing mixed destination management strategies needs a real commitment from destinations to face their own current governance and resilience issues (Dredge, 2018), in order to anticipate potential major global challenges which could undermine the reputation of tourism destinations. If destinations follow professional methodologies of planification, the tourism benefits should be distributed across a wide range of collectives, as youth generations, women, etc. The risk-management governance procedures are necessary to reach an effective benefit-sharing from tourism, even at tourism crisis, not minimizing the benefit-sharing (Heslinga et al., 2020). Therefore, the destination management organizations (DMOs) roles must change from the traditional promotional objectives. Due to the current circumstances, DMOs strategies must seek for the benefit of the destination, its economy, collectives, and its communities. These institutions must focus on promoting the destination, receiving travelers providing to them trust, safety, security, added value, and enabling new business opportunities for the local community (Reinhold et al., 2019). A new scenario, where destinations must be prepared to give a quick response to all kind of hazard, disasters, and crisis, through the implementation of professional updated methodologies.

The effects of COVID-19 on the SDGS strategies for tourism planning. The ‘glocal’ social movements after the pandemic

The current COVID-19 crisis has steered to a tourism lockdown and worldwide travel prohibitions, causing global tourism to a full stop. These procedures are having a devastating effect on international tourism, and the crisis management strategies researched previously must being focused to the positive movements born to boost the SDGs implementation in the travel & tourism industry, not aligned with the business and economic profit, but to the sustainable approach looking to implement the previously mentioned mixed destination management strategies.

But how the current situation has affected to the initiatives which enhanced the integration of the SDGs in tourism? The movement limitations are affecting different kind of tourism planification projects regarding to SDGs action, especially those facing challenges in developing countries: F&B companies, historical destinations, and different tourism companies. This sanitary crisis is likewise supposed to have a more extensive impact, while other industries may recuperate all the more quickly. Thus, particularly for destinations where the SDGs policies were being developed, it is urgent to provide integrated measures to secure this planification and alleviate the financial effect of this emergency.

Along these times of lockdown, several movements aligned with the SDGs have been developed to enhance the importance of the rebirth of the tourism industry taking advantage of the current situation. The destination tourism policymakers began to build up very engaging strategies in the last years and months aim to develop the SDGs in tourism focusing on sustainable planning through the mixed strategies. UNDP and UNWTO called for voluntary national reviews (VNR) within different countries to analyse the direct and indirect correlations that these countries are implementing with the SDGs in tourism (UNWTO, & UNDP, 2017). Among these countries, 41 of them mentioned that they were working to develop the SDGs 8, 12 and 17, but the COVID-19 lead to miss these developing opportunities in harnessing tourism's true potential unsustainable development.

From 2015 to nowadays, these sustainable based tourism planning strategies for destinations became global, and those policymakers realised that it was necessary to not only contribute to the SDGs, but also get global and international benefits from common actions and development towards the SDGs, including the private sector, looking for policy coherence, taking advantage of the worldwide linkages within tourism destinations. In fact, there were different territories which combined their efforts through social movements, tourism associations in private companies (UNWTO, & UNDP, 2017).

Due to COVID-19, different strategies planned to avoid the most relevant tourism threats were slowed down or even stopped the SDGs policy progress. Most of destination planners are now discussing if this situation will take them back to an old times price war, getting into the old-times previously mentioned approach to destination strategies 100% based on business and economic profit, in order to alleviate the situation as fast as possible, and leaving the sustainable planification when promoting destinations or selling travel & tourism products and activities.

To avoid this threat and clear steps back, some of the social movements created in the last period prior to the sanitary emergency are working to positively affect the industry. These movements have been initiated in a local basis but due to the importance for the tourism industry, they all became global at an early stage being adopted in many destinations all around the world. They became 'glocal' initiatives based on the SDGs. For example, those fighting for fair working conditions within hospitality and F&B industry, or movements to explore a slow travel consumption, giving importance to less visited and less crowded destinations, etc. The continuation of these movements depends to a large extend on a supportive commitment from destination leaders from both public and private sector fostering the accomplishments already achieved to avoid stepping back on these strategies based on economic profit.

Some current SDGS related initiatives and movements

In this section we research on some examples of these 'glocal' initiatives addressing the SDGs implementation within the tourism industry.

There is no doubt that 'SDG1-No poverty' is one of the most achievable objectives in this industry. It seems that both public and private sector are committed to do so. SDG1 has a different perspective depending on the part of the planet Earth where tourism is being an economic activity. The nature of poverty changes depending on the geographic location, but tourism can foster economic development, alleviating poverty at all levels, and avoiding negative effects of global tourism, producing a much fairer scenarios for the human people (Scheyvens, & Hughes, 2019). In this regard, an example of a successful initiative is being:

Red Rocks ecotourism initiative in Rwanda is doing its best fighting against poverty, creating alternative strategies during COVID-19 through the following activities: Keeping local cultural scenes alive, so staff keeps working, increasing online cultural activities through Social Media platforms, keeping their activities alive. This initiative cares about a community village (of indigenous people) who used to depend on forest tourism, and now are sustained by funds of the initiative to support food for them (UNWTO, 2020).

Regarding 'SDG3-Good health and wellbeing' and the related 'SDG6-Clean water sanitation', any related planification will contribute to positive tourism, by revealing how mindful and eudaimonic visitor experiences are organised by adventure tour guides in natural settings (Farkić et al., 2020).

As an example, the Hungarian Government proposed to include little lake-based villages in the national tourism map, for example, Kehidakustány, which used to be a poor place whose inhabitants worked in the fields. This villages had old thermal medical baths and their water became nationally famous. Government and tourism associations decided to develop it into a 'sustainable spa destinations' to preserve the health of the tourists and nationals and providing a new mineral water brand giving employment opportunities to local populations of these villages. It could be a new tourist destination in the region, providing hundreds of jobs for the local community in tourism. Thus, thanks to the preservation of the clean water and the good health (SDGs 3/6), the inhabitants of these regions became tourism employees, while others established their own entrepreneurships and started to work in tourism too (UNWTO, 2020).

Another example of a local movement which became global is known as 'Las Kellys', which is the self-named colloquial title to describe a Spanish movement formed by the housekeeping feminine staff working in the Canary Islands hotels, which became global due to their Social Media exposition. This collective was created to face the severe salary inequalities compared with some other hotel staff positions, and the fight against the gender inequalities within the hospitality industry, directly hitting the 'SDG5-Gender quality' and 'SDG10-Reduced inequalities' (Las Kellys, s. f.).

During the last years, the achieved different goals on labor conditions once the social movement became national in Spain. COVID-19 did not stop their fight, since they took advantage of the hotels lockdown to became more global, adding associations from all around Europe, and even introducing their cause in the European Parliament.

This social movement is currently incorporating new collectives of non-developed countries where the housekeeping staff is under the limit of poverty, being exploited through slaving labor conditions, as the case of Rohingya women refugees exploited in luxury hotels of Myanmar and Thailand (Hassan et al., 2018). This is a clear example on how to work for sustainable changes in tourism based on SDGs implication from a local perspective to a global action.

Regarding 'glocal' movements but led by tourism destinations, we find initiatives hitting the 'SDG11-Sustainable cities'. Most of tourism destinations are facing the problem of overcrowding and of overtourism, boosting the negative effects of the tourism activity on the local population and local way of life, moving apart from being a sustainable tourism destination and turning into an alienated destination. To face this big global issue, authorities have taken measures and have implemented strategies striving for a balance between tourism disturbance and local living. There are several cases in the world, as Venice, Barcelona, or Amsterdam. Small steps have been taken at a local level, for example, in Seville, where the gentrification is slowly being deleted to give more room to the local way of life (Díaz-Parra, & Jover, 2021), or in Budapest, where local authorities are re-branding the city from overtourism thanks to the boosting of the local heritage, local culture and local identity (Smith et al., 2019). Some more cities are reducing the tourism accommodation offer as well as creating pedestrian areas for local activities, avoiding the creation of tourism business at these districts.

This movement became also 'glocal', since most of the locally implemented ideas to face this issue are trying to be implemented at some more cities, getting inspiration from previous successful stories. This 'glocal' perspective increased during the COVID-19 lockdown of the tourism industry and travel restrictions, since many cities developed overtourism-plans to revert the situations and began to implement ideas looking for balancing the life of the residents with the leisure motivations of the tourists.

These are some examples of 'glocal' initiatives which are currently supporting the application of the SDGs in tourism. We could mention hundreds of them which are going on at this time all around the globe, showing that the current approach of empowering destinations through new paradigms of sustainable planification is not only a trend, but a new concept within the tourism industry.

This new paradigm shifted the destination planification strategies from the risk management and alleviation actions to the prevention plans based on sustainability and the change of destinations business model. Is it clear that the most recent approach to destination management is desirable, moving apart from the old economic profit destination planification to a long-term sustainable vision through mixed strategies where SDGs are the main driver of the required objectives?

These examples, as many others that we could have included in this research, show that COVID-19 did not stop the rise of these tourism policies aligned with the SDGs.

Furthermore, this pandemic has demonstrated that sustainable planification is the only way to reach a long-term success for tourism destinations. It has been manifest that to preserve the profitability of the tourism businesses and destinations is not about to attract a challenging number of visitors, increasing tourist statistics and expending amounts and figures, growing room-nights and destination popularity, but drafting policies to preserve local heritage for next generations, the local population way of life, which basically means a true way of attracting visitors, the environment of the destination itself, and anything but producing inequalities, looking for incorporating a local vision when planning destination strategies related to tourism.

The proposed decalogue

As a result of the previous sections analyzed all along this document, it is going to be introduced a proposed decalogue on strategies to empower destinations enhancing the confidence of the public tourism policy strategists to alleviate and improve the tourism industry after this pandemic crisis.

The decalogue results as a combination of the empirical and qualitative facts analysed in this article. In one side, taking into consideration that the most successful strategy for managing destinations is the mixed approach focused on sustainable planning, leaving any other methodology which would be exclusively based on economic profit. In the other side, this decalogue also suggests the required integration of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) when drafting tourism strategies at destinations, mainly those affecting and being affected by the travel & tourism industry. Finally, this decalogue has been developed taking into consideration the application of the 'glocal' perspective of action, from the expansion of local social movements and local initiatives, which have become global movements due to the international actions taken.

Combining these three already stated empirical facts, tourism destinations will be able to apply this decalogue in order to give a boost to their industry self-confidence, encouraging both public and private sector to accomplish long-term planification strategies in tourism, which will prevent the destination from slow recovery stages, when any other expected or non-expected crisis will arise.

1. Development of resilience in tourism companies and organizations after COVID-19

Resilience is more relevant now than ever. We understand resilience as the capacity of tourism organizations that suffer catastrophes of some kind to regain balance (Gutiérrez, 2013). The current SDGs initiatives revealed how resilience is feasible when integrating sustainable initiatives helping companies and destinations equally. When a crisis happens, destinations should prioritize the industry development through the management and funding of affected local tourism companies. At that potential moment in time, resilience must be recognized as the way to implement and apply local development programs to enhance the tourism activity soonest.

2. Public-private association for the recovery of tourism

The competitiveness of tourism destinations requires the alignment of local clusters that support the articulation of policies with a strategic vision, channeling efforts assumed by the various tourism stakeholders that involve it under a common direction and commitment (Perles, & Ramón-Rodríguez, 2017). Thus, it is necessary to create sustainable plans that facilitate the generation of mutual trust between local stakeholders to accelerate the recovery of the tourism activity with the development of joint actions. This strategy will identify and reach a consensus on the priority initiatives to be undertaken when tourism activity would start again, preparing a clear action plan, properly funded, and considering real opportunities of quick implementation.

3. Implementation of a communication plan

When a tourism crisis hits, it will be necessary to have prepared a developed (and implemented) culture of crisis communication. At that stage, it will not be the time to act on their own, but rather to reinforce a culture of destination collaboration between all the organizations involved, DMOs, convention bureau, hotels and any other tourism companies and, in general, of all those agents who benefit from a tourist activity (Ortega, & Rodríguez, 2005). In this regard, it is desirable to select the time and format of the official communications to be made, using updated data that reduces the tourist's uneasiness. This transparency must reach global segments of potential travelers and local population, also considering the possibility of having dedicated local ambassadors who could convey calmness messages, delivering trust.

4. Media exposition strategy of key characters during the crisis

It is important to spread messages previously developed in the crisis-communication plan, thus, the increase in the use of networks and Social Media causes the sharing of certain uncontested or directly false information (O'Brien et al., 2020), and it becomes a problem on the tourism destination perception. Therefore, it is necessary educate people in charge of communicate messages to travelers, in order to avoid misunderstandings, unnecessary alarms, or any other type of situation. At some stage, it is convenient for tourism destinations to involve local tourism personalities and local tourism staff to communicate some concrete key messages, keeping the destination branding perception in an honest level.

5. Developing training programs that accelerate the recovery of tourist destinations

It has become essential to prepare training programs related to tourism development in order to train professionals for upcoming critical and risky circumstances. It is important to examine and learn about the tourist opportunities and associations that may exist in each region (Joppe et al., 2020), in order to adapt training programs to address common issues related to the transformation of the industry (Kwok, & Koh, 2020). These training programs should address issues related to digital transformation, the development of sustainable tourism, or tourism accessibility. These programs must involve local communities, public and private organizations, as well as private tourism companies.

6. Creating a strategy to develop the tourism workforce of the near future

It is needed to make a complete analysis of trends in supply and demand of the labor market within the COVID-19 times, trying to avoid vulnerable situations of workers, keeping the equality of the workforce, concretely women jobs (Ud Din et al., 2020). It is critical to identifying specific opportunities and needs for training in the short, medium, and long term (Alberti, & Perrotta, 2020). Both public and private sector must involve talent to strengthen the tourism industry in order to increase training programs at national level, positioning tourism as a safe source of employment.

This strategy is fully aligned with SDGs in tourism, since the training of the labor force is essential to increase the guest experience at the destination, as well as the service provided to tourists and visitors, increasing the destination perception of professionality. Unfortunately, there are many destinations which perceives this policy as a cost, instead of a profitable investment, and moving back into an old approach to destination management, based on numbers and figures at all. To develop the workforce is a guarantee of best practices application, it becomes a starting point for creating disruptive tourism local initiatives which would be replicable in a global scenario.

7. Widening the scope of work of the destination management organizations (DMOs)

A DMO can contribute to reduce the impact of COVID-19 crisis, integrating governance strategies based on coopetition networks (Chim-Miki, 2020). Thus, it is necessary to implement a DMO roadmap incorporating new initiatives, for example, the meetings industry; attracting events helps its local economy increasing the possibilities of becoming a recovered destination (Kovačevič, 2017), widening the scope of work of the DMO.

8. Involving local communities through promoting local tourism

Tourism is a job opportunities niche all around the world. The local communities must appreciate that this is an industry full of employment opportunities, not only opportunities which are already existing, but some more which could be suitable to be initiated by locals. In the end, it is necessary to incorporate non-existing local tourism products with attractive potential for travelers and visitors (Martini et al., 2017). Specially in this COVID-19 recovery period, local tourism helps communities to launch their economies after the pandemic. Sense of belonging is crucial to motivate local communities to considering to be part of the tourism industry, and as much authentic is the value proposals to the local population, more authentic is the experience to be received by tourists at that destination. Hence, authenticity is one of the rising stars when planning from a sustainable tourism perspective and taking SDGs as an inspiration of tourism products and service innovation.

9. Women empowerment at COVID-19 stage

As mentioned previously, women workforce is taking part on social movements claiming for better conditions and fair opportunities within the tourism and hospitality industry. These claims will last after the post-COVID-19 stage, since they are currently affected by gender inequality in several tourism regions of the world (Figueroa-Domecq, & Segovia-Pérez, 2020). Gender inequality in the tourism sector cannot be a weak point nowadays, but as we have noticed, there is a long way to walk to guarantee the women's empowerment, providing fair access to tourism labor programs for women.

10. The challenge of youth employment

From a negative 'glocal' perspective, young generations have been the most disadvantaged due to the COVID-19 crisis, since most of them lost their jobs in the tourism industry. Youth workforce incorporation to the tourism industry must remain as a clear objective, to not to leave this generation behind. The incorporation of young worforce to the tourism industry is something which have occurred always from the past (Robinson et al., 2019), delivering new vocational professionals to the local tourism industry of any destination. The destination management organizations must create different youth employment strategies to increase tourism employment and tourism entrepreneurship, becoming ambassadors of their own destination in their same generation of travelers.

Conclussions

The tourism destinations have been cruelly harmed by this pandemic, and it will not be easy to reach the tourism statistics of the last years, we have noticed it from an empirical point of view. Thus, destinations must not only relive themselves, recovering from this situation in a professional way, but preparing themselves to potential future similar crisis scenarios. The planning strategies must empower destinations, but not through aggressive policies based on price and discounts.

Sustainability is the key. Long-term planning is a demonstrated and successful way of supporting consistent tourism development, incorporating human and heritage resources to the planification equation.

We have seen how COVID-19 has affected destinations worldwide, but not only because of national and international travel restrictions, but also concrete destinations which were based on old planning approaches based on volume of tourism and volume of incomes. Interestingly, the less affected destinations have been those in which the dependence on a concrete business model was not occurring, being more focused on inherent characteristics, and authenticity.

The proposed decalogue is an application for any destination recovery from a sustainable planning perspective based on a mixed approach of tourism management strategies. It was inspired in the SDGs implementation, proving that even in times of crisis, resilience and sustainable recovery are possible.

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