Cinnamon Hotels & Resorts will mark the occasion of ‘World Tourism Day 2015’ with the first-ever ‘Future of Tourism & Responsible Travel for Driving Revenue’ Summit. Scheduled to be held on September 28 at Cinnamon Lakeside Colombo, Cinnamon Future of Tourism Summit will have global experts exploring the future trends of tourism as well as responsible travel practices for driving revenue.

The summit will discuss relevant and contemporary topics highlighting the importance of accountability in revenue generation, as an essential component of the future of international travel and tourism. During the symposium, a distinguished panel of global industry professionals and experts on sustainability and responsible travel will speak on the current and future trends in tourism and the importance of responsibility, resource efficiency and risk management, enhancing brand equity through responsible tourism, community engagement and workforce motivation, working with sustainable travel companies, growth in experiential tourism, relationship between wellness tourism and responsible tourism and the accessibility of potential target markets.

Panellist Prof. Mohan Munasinghe will be delivering the keynote for the summit. He is a Nobel Peace Prize Winner and Vice Chair of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. His knowledge on Climate Change and his experience gained as the Founder Chairman of the Munasinghe Institute of Development (MIND) and Senior Advisor to the Government of Sri Lanka will benefit the audience greatly in relation to such topics as sustainable industry development and responsible tourism.  Adviser to the World Economic Forum on Shared Economy and Shareable Cities and academic on the future of travel and tourism, April Rinne has gained vast insight into microfinance, law, policy, water and social enterprise. Her love for catalysing early conversations, forging partnerships and assisting individuals, companies, organisations and communities alike has helped perceive world economy in radically new ways. The conference will also feature Dr. Ian Yeoman. The world’s only professional futurologist specializing in travel and tourism, he uses advanced techniques such as economic modelling, trends analysis and scenario construction to analyse the future of the industry. 

Future of Tourism speaker, Prof. Sarath Kotagama is a conservationist and head of the Department of Zoology at the University of Colombo. His extraordinary service to Sri Lanka as an ornithologist and Environmentalist has been recognized by the ‘Distinguished Service Award for Environment Education and Journalism’ (2003) by the International Society for Conservation Biology. His focus on the necessity of conservation in growing industries like nature tourism will be highlighted at the convention. At the symposium, Wilhelm K. Weber will speak on yield and revenue management, hotel technology and hospitality management.  He is a partner of the Swiss Hospitality Solutions AG and a lecturer at University of Salzburg. 

Senior Research Analyst at Euromonitor International, Shabori Das will also be part of the panel of speakers at the Future of Tourism convention. She is an industry expert for travel and tourism and thrives in identifying cross industry trends and has written several articles on the travel industry. Prof. Dr. Roland Conrady, Director of the world’s largest tourism convention ‘ITB Berlin’ and President of the German Society of Tourism Research (DGT), is an authority on tourism and travel management. Based on his extensive research and teachings, his talk will focus is on air travel, e-business and tourism.

The summit will also present Robert Govers. He is a lecturer of the UNESCO World Heritage Work Master Programme, independent advisor for national, regional and city government administrations and a visiting scholar at various institutions in Belgium, The Netherlands, Italy and Dubai. His contribution at the event will focus on place branding and public diplomacy. René Massatti-Trendone offers insights into the marketing world of tomorrow and strives to convey to audiences the concrete benefits of innovation for their daily business. A clearly-structured speaker and passionate discussion partner, he specialises in trends that are relevant to the marketing industry.