MEPs said on Thursday, that the EU criteria for “safe and clean tourism, including a common vaccination certificate,” should be a part of a new EU strategy on sustainable tourism.

The draft resolution on establishing an EU strategy for sustainable tourism, adopted by Transport and Tourism Committee on Thursday by 47 votes in favour and 2 against, urges EU countries to include the tourism and travel sectors in their recovery plans and consider temporarily reducing VAT on these services.

The text of the draft resolution says that “the pandemic shifted traveller’s demand toward safe and clean and more sustainable tourism.”

It asks the member states to “fully and without delay implement common criteria for safe travel, with an EU Health Safety protocol for testing before departure, and applying quarantine requirement as a last resort.”

MEPs said that they also want a “common vaccination certificate,” which could become an alternative to PCR tests and quarantine requirements, once there is “sufficient evidence that vaccinated persons do not transmit the virus, or mutual recognition of vaccination procedures.”

They also stress the “importance of deploying EU Passenger Locater Forms and developing voluntary, interoperable and anonymised tracking, tracing and warning apps.”

The draft resolution also urged the Commission to introduce the “EU hygiene certification seal, which could certify minimum Covid-19 virus prevention and control standards and could help to restore consumer’s trust in tourism and travel sectors.”

They also welcomed the ‘Re-open EU’ portal and urged EU countries to send clear information on the application or lifting of future restrictions on free movement to the Commission.

MEPs also advocate a need to look beyond the pandemic and replace the 2010 strategy on EU tourism to maintain Europe’s standing as a leading destination. The text finally calls on the Commission to set up a European Agency for Tourism.

EP rapporteur Cláudia Monteiro de Aguiar, stated, “with summer just around the corner, we want to avoid past errors and put in place uniform travel measures, such as an EU protocol for tests before departure, a vaccination certificate, and a European sanitary seal.”

Cláudia Monteiro de Aguiar went on to say that “tourism is one of the sectors that has been hit the hardest by this pandemic. It needs to be properly included in the Member States’ recovery plans and a mechanism to clearly show whether it benefits from EU support.”

The resolution on establishing an EU strategy for sustainable tourism now needs to be voted by the full house of the Parliament, possibly during the March II session.

Photo by Alain Salvary

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