Tourism Industry and Circular Economy : Deep Interlinkages

Tourism plays a key role in promoting growth, development, and livelihoods. It strengthens “social foundations” and creates sustainable values through its multiplier effects and interconnectedness with Sustainable Development Goals. Equally important are tourism’s environmental impacts, carbon footprints, and greenhouse gas emissions, which are likely to exacerbate by rising global tourism and unending demands for materials, resources, and products. Thus, the prevalent ‘business as usual’ production approach is widely questioned, and decoupling the socioeconomic development from environmental impacts is emphasized to lay down the basis of sustainable and smart green tourism by applying circular economy principles in tourism. The coronavirus, though it was an irreparable disaster for tourism, gave an opportunity to rebuild it on circular economy principles. This paper explored the interlinkages between the circular economy and the tourism industry from the perspective of building a circular ecosystem in tourism, given its interdependence and interconnectedness. The approach followed is qualitative and exploratory, and reviews the available literature, which is fragmented and scattered. It brings out that deep interlinkages exist between the circular economy and travel and tourism; and the circular economy principles’ application (6Rs - refuse, reduce, reuse, repair, refurbish, recycle) in tourism can contribute substantially towards resilient tourism ecosystem and social and economic progress through reduced consumption of primary energy sources and materials. The practical and theoretical implications are clearly visible to all stakeholders, including managers, policymakers, and organizations. Managers face a challenge to find ways and means to initiate a transition to a circular economy in tourism to bring down the circularity gap. Since this study is not sector-specific and assumes the availability of technical abilities, engineering skills, government policies, and institutional structures for products and services, etc., these areas can be taken up as future research areas.