Sustainability Research Agenda for Tourism, Hospitality and Recreation. Literature Review of Themes

Sustainable development is high on local, national, and international political agendas. Just think of the climate crisis, biodiversity crisis, the nitrogen crisis, the health crisis, the demise of silence and quiet areas, unequal distribution of wealth and extreme poverty, and the stagnating development of the circular
economy and challenges of a zero-emissions future. Sustainable development consists of aspects in the field of the environment, people, and the economy, of which some are limiting and some need balancing. The perspective of stakeholders in the sector, companies, governments, residents, customers, and stakeholders is of great importance. The tourism, hospitality & recreation sector (THR) plays a dual role in this: on the one hand, it creates value from natural resources such as the quality of nature, biodiversity, landscape, silence, clean air, and cultural heritage. On the other hand, the THR sector has an impact on climate change, nitrogen oxides, loss of biodiversity and silence, and increasingly also on local communities at destinations.
The THR sector is sometimes a frontrunner in providing solutions to crises, but in many cases also lags. For instance, where emissions of carbon dioxide are now slowly reducing in most sectors, those of THR are still on the rise (Scott & Gössling, 2021).
To answer the question: why is this the case?, this report describes knowledge gaps and proposes a research agenda for the Dutch THR sector.