World Tourism Day

What the day is

World Tourism Day is observed on September 27. It is a United Nations observance, run by the UN's tourism agency, and each year it is built around a theme, with a different country hosting the official events.

The framing is economic and social rather than promotional. Tourism is one of the largest employers in the world and a primary source of foreign income for many countries, and the day tends to focus on how those benefits are distributed and what the costs are.

Origin and background

The date marks the anniversary of the adoption of the agency's statutes in 1970, and the observance itself has been held since 1980. September was chosen partly because it falls at the end of the high season in the northern hemisphere and the start of it in the south.

The themes over the years track the industry's arguments with itself: rural development, jobs, accessibility, green investment. Those debates have sharpened as overtourism has become a visible problem in a number of European and Asian cities, where housing, water and transport are under pressure from visitor numbers that local infrastructure was never built for. The counter-argument is equally real, since for many communities tourism is the only industry that pays.

How to take part

The most useful version of this day is about how you travel rather than whether you do.

• Be a tourist where you live. Most people have not seen the things visitors come for, and local attractions are quieter in the off season.
• Spend locally when you travel: family-run places to stay, independent restaurants, local guides. That is what determines whether tourist money stays in the place you visited.
• Go slightly off-peak or slightly off-center. It is cheaper, less crowded, and eases pressure on the places that are struggling with it.
• Learn a few words of the language before arriving.
• Respect the places people actually live. Residential streets are not attractions.