Glasgow Sustainable Policy and Action Plan

Glasgow aspires to become one of Europe’s leading sustainable tourism destinations. The city has an overall goal to be carbon neutral by 2030 and acknowledges the destination’s role in promoting and encouraging responsible tourism.

Using the UN Sustainable Development Goals as inspiration, the city will focus on developing, measuring and reporting on the following actions.

The Tourism, Destination Marketing, Events and Convention Bureau team at Glasgow Life are working with partners, VisitScotland and Scottish Enterprise, as well as industry to develop and report on Sustainable Glasgow initiatives.

The People Make Glasgow Greener strategy sets out our plans and vision to see our city move from ‘steam, to green’.

This Sustainable Tourism and Conventions Action Plan is a first phase Climate Action Plan for Tourism & Conventions in Glasgow.

It sets out key short to medium-term actions which focus on driving and supporting change across the sector. The actions within this plan feed into and directly

• support the Glasgow Tourism & Visitor Plan 2023
• support Glasgow's Climate Plan
• support the national tourism strategy Scotland Outlook 2030
• are aligned to UN Sustainable Development Goals.

We are experiencing dynamic change and there is a need now for our tourism industry, government, public sector and communities to collectively respond, adapt and work together to deliver responsible, sustainable and managed growth for the future.

sign the UNESCO Sustainable Travel Pledge

The UNESCO Sustainable Travel Pledge aims to promote sustainable travel, community resilience and heritage conservation globally. By signing the Pledge, properties publicly commit to actions that will reduce the environmental impact of their businesses, raising awareness to travellers and helping them make more sustainable travel choices.

The Pledge is free and easy to join, whether for individual self-catering properties or global hotel chains, and everything in between. Read more about The Pledge and sign up on the UNESCO website. 

EarthCheck 

EarthCheck is the world’s leading scientific benchmarking, certification and advisory group for travel and tourism. Since 1987, EarthCheck have helped businesses, communities and governments to deliver clean, safe, prosperous and healthy destinations for travellers to visit, live, work and play. in November 2021, Glasgow become the UK's first city to achieve EarthCheck Benchmarked Community status.

Sustainable Conference Destination

In August 2016, Glasgow became the first city in the UK to be included in a new sustainability ranking of leading international conference destinations. The Global Destination Sustainability Index (GDS Index) aims to bring destinations together to benchmark and improve the social and environmental performance of their respective meetings industries by highlighting best practice and promoting responsible business tourism. Glasgow is currently ranked as number 4 in the world.

Glasgow Convention Bureau actively promotes greener options to conference organisers and works with industry to highlight and encourage businesses to implement environmentally friendly practices. They were the first ever convention bureau to win a Green Tourism Award as well as the first in the world to join Tourism Declares.

The below documents provide industry with helpful summaries of how they can be more 'green'. 

• Tips for how businesses can be more energy efficient.
• Tips for how businesses can practice sustainable purchasing.
• Tips for businesses to improve waste management.
• Tips for businesses to improve water management.

UN Framework Convention on Climate Change - COP26

The Scottish Event Campus hosted the UN Climate Change Conference from 31 October to 12 November 2021. This globally significant event brought the world together to address climate change. COP26 was be the biggest conference ever staged in Scotland, welcoming participants from all over the world. For more information visit the conference website.

Supporting your business:

There are many reasons to become more sustainable:

• Increasing efficiency and reducing running costs 
• Protecting and enhancing our environment and cultural heritage
• Enhancing the visitor experience 
• Ensuring legal compliance
• Gaining market advantage

There are many actions that your business can benefit from quickly which are simple and cost little or nothing.

For more information on sustainable tourism, VisitScotland.org has a dedicated section of helpful resources including factsheets helping your business become more sustainable.

Circular Glasgow - Plate Up for Glasgow campaign 2021

Plate up for Glasgow was a hospitality industry led month-long campaign in the lead up to COP26. The campaign encouraged Glasgow based businesses within the food and drink sector to offer diners a zero-waste dining option throughout the campaign period. If you are a Glasgow based business looking to drive revenue, footfall and sustainability within the hospitality and food service sector. Be inspired to be more circular in your business on the Plate up for Glasgow website. 

Too Good to Go

Each day businesses throw out fresh food because they were unable to sell it in time. Not only is this wasteful and bad for the environment, but it also costs businesses a lot of money. Too Good to Go is a fantastic resource for businesses who are looking to reduce their food waste and recoup some of those wasted costs. Visit the Too Good to Go website for more information.

Green Tourism

Green Tourism's expert advice, eco-development programmes and internationally respected accreditation scheme have helped thousands of businesses adopt greener working practices, saving them money and making a real difference to the environment.

Find out if your business could achieve an award with Green Tourism's FREE 10 minute green check quiz.

Green Key 

Green Key award is the leading standard for excellence in the field of environmental responsibility and sustainable operation within the tourism industry. This prestigious eco-label represents a commitment by businesses that their premises adhere to the strict criteria set by the Foundation for Environmental Education. A Green Key stands for the promise to its guests that by opting to stay with the Green Key establishment, they are helping to make a difference on an environmental level. Read more on the Green Key website. 

Zero Waste Scotland 

Zero Waste Scotland exists to lead Scotland to use products and resources responsibly, focusing on where they can have the greatest impact on climate change. Their goal is to motivate individuals and businesses to embrace the environmental, economic, and social benefits of a circular economy. 

They have two main areas of business support: resource efficiency and circular economy:

Energy Efficient Business Support offers businesses free support to reduce costs by implementing resource efficiencies in energy, water, raw materials and waste management.

The Circular Economy Accelerator programme aims to increase the resource efficiency of Scottish SMEs, further develop and strengthen Scotland's circular economy, and support community-based organisations to build on existing local resources. 

Their Circular Economy Business Support Service delivers tailored, expert, one-to-one consultancy directly to small and medium sized businesses across all sectors in Scotland looking to develop circular business models. It’s designed to help companies explore more circular ways of doing business that can result in resource efficiencies, improved profitability, higher quality products, increased customer base and alternative supply chains for your business.