Fahrradausflug mit der Familie © visitBerlin, Photo: Thomas Kierok
Visit Berlin has joined as a Member of the Global Sustainable Tourism Council (GSTC).
visitBerlin (Berlin Tourismus & Kongress GmbH) is the city’s official marketing agency and promotes Berlin as a tourism and convention destination worldwide. Together with partners from politics, business and society, visitBerlin pursues the goal of further developing Berlin tourism and positioning it for the future. The focus is on urban compatibility and sustainability.
In the convention sector, the visitBerlin Berlin Convention Office acquires conferences, fairs and congresses for Germany’s capital city. As a tour operator, visitBerlin also issues the Berlin WelcomeCard, the city’s official tourist ticket. The company also operates the Berlin Tourist Info Centres.
visitBerlin is funded by the Berlin Senate as a public-private partnership. However, a sizable proportion of its budget is generated by its own activities and reinvested in promotional campaigns for Berlin.
visitBerlin’s New Sustainability Strategy
VisitBerlin takes responsibility as a company. The aim of a new visitBerlin sustainability strategy is to anchor this topic even better in the company and to develop it further. For this purpose, a sustainability officer has been appointed at visitBerlin. Aspects such as city-friendly, quality-oriented tourism marketing and management, but also sustainable product development are in the foreground of the strategic considerations.
As part of implementing the new sustainability strategy, visitBerlin joined the Global Sustainable Tourism Council (GSTC), taking this development an important step forward.
“Joining the Global Sustainable Tourism Council fits in with our sustainable commitment to our city and our partners. It will also make it visible internationally. visitBerlin has already been dealing with ecological and social sustainability for several years – issues that we need to take care of so that Berlin remains livable and lovable for our guests in the future,” says Burkhard Kieker, Chief Executive Officer of visitBerlin
Sustainable Tourism Initiatives in Berlin
For years, visitBerlin has contributed to a city-friendly tourism development with numerous projects. In order to inform tourism service providers for the important future topic, various workshops on the topics of sustainability, resilience and transformation are offered on visitBerlin’s e-learning platform TourismusHub.
Travelers looking for green offers can find information on visitBerlin.de, e.g. hotels with sustainability labels, excursion tips, gastronomic and shopping offers, sustainable places or bike tours.
The Berlin Convention Office of visitBerlin has been running the Sustainable Meetings Berlin initiative since 2019, which specializes in sustainable event planning in the meeting and convention industry.
Sustainable meetings in Berlin
The visitBerlin Berlin Convention Office has launched this growing initiative – the first platform for sustainable event planning in Berlin, in cooperation with meeting hotels, venues, service providers and a consulting sustainability agency.
“Sustainable event planning is a social and economic requirement – and the chance to live up to our responsibility. Sustainable Meetings Berlin is our platform with sustainable service providers, tips and information for planning sustainable events,” says Marco Oelschlegel, Director of visitBerlin Berlin Convention Office.
GSTC Welcomes Berlin
“As an important city in global tourism and in the life of Germany and all of Europe, Berlin’s commitment to sustainable tourism development would not only influence Berlin’s tourism industry but inspire other European cities to do the same. GSTC heartily welcomes visitBerlin into our network of policy-makers and businesses striving to work systematically and holistically on more sustainable forms of tourism,” says Randy Durband, CEO of GSTC.
GSTC encourages destinations pursuing sustainability practices in development and management of tourism, to join as GSTC members and apply the GSTC Destination Criteria (which eventually can lead to achieving certification by a GSTC-Accredited Certification Body) and support local business to apply the GSTC Industry Criteria.
