BAKU, Azerbaijan, May 6. The Economic Cooperation Organization (ECO) is in the process of establishing an Advisory Committee on Tourism within the organization, Jasur Rajabov, the Director of Tourism for ECO, told Trend.
"This body will comprise representatives from both the public and private sectors, as well as academia, which is crucial for uniting stakeholders in the tourism sector. Once the framework of this body is created, we will discuss it more in detail. It will be very helpful to unite stakeholders in the tourism sector," he said.
Rajabov also mentioned that the President of Uzbekistan, Shavkat Mirziyoyev, was the first to endorse this initiative.
Furthermore, ECO is initiating another project, still in its early stages, aiming to appoint tourism ambassadors. This issue was discussed during the last regional planning council (RPC) meeting of the ECO, and although preliminary support was received from member countries, implementation is expected to take place next year.
In addition to these efforts, ECO is working on standardization in collaboration with the Global Sustainable Tourism Council (GSTC) to establish quality standards and sustainable tourism criteria for accommodation facilities, including hotels and hostels.
"In terms of branding, regulations, laws, and quality requirements must all be harmonized. For this reason, we are also collaborating with the Global Sustainable Tourism Council (GSTC) on standardization-related concerns. They advise us to start with the fundamental norms and progress them into more sophisticated ones," he remarked.
The director pointed out that ECO has conducted four meetings of a working group on standardization, resulting in a draft document outlining standards for accommodation facilities and sustainable tourism criteria.
To note, the ECO was founded in 1985 by Iran, Pakistan, and Türkiye as an intergovernmental regional organization aimed at fostering economic, technical, and cultural cooperation among member states.
In 1992, the organization underwent further expansion with the accession of seven new members: Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan.