historic site take without causing
harm or rendering the destination
unattractive? As we have always said
numbers are not all the answers—
we need good quality and preferably well spread over the whole year.
We cannot keep growing in numbers but we can keep improving on
the quality.
Maximising our country’s and our
region’s assets is the secret to more
sustained and bigger successes.
I: Empowering people—to move
away from division and to see what
unifies us; to safeguard cultural
differences but to embrace neighbours as well as travellers from distant lands. Do you really believe
we can change the world through
tourism, even partly?
TF: Tourism has a huge educational
side to it—both for the traveller and
the people of the traveller’s destination. This side of the educational aspect can always be furthered.
Tourism can - and does - manage
to destroy pre-conceived prejudices and turn wrong perceptions
to new realities. It can also enable exchanges and appreciation of
different cultures. We’re not attempting or saying it is possible to
change the world in a day’s forum
or in the foreseeable future. But we
can change it a little bit at a time.
Tourism brings people together in
a leisurely environment, and when
people get together in a leisurely
environment they get to understand each other better.
I: From a small organisation to
spearheading an international
Foundation. Your involvement in
MHRA has been quite impressive.
What’s next?
TF: The organisation will evolve
irrespective of the individual leading it and it will go on evolving and
I sincerely hope
that MHRA will
be instrumental
in creating an
environment of
steady economic
growth
maturing. Without what went on
before me, without the great work
done by my predecessors, I would
not even exist as a President. Different times call for different ways
forward and this organisation and
hopefully the Foundation will go
on increasing their importance
and their reach.
Today the MHRA has its own established structure. It also has an
international group of people who
form part of it as Directors of the
Foundation. I sincerely hope that
MHRA will be instrumental in
creating an environment of steady
economic growth in the hospitality industry and leveraging this to
bring some peace into our region.
I: Culture, tradition, heritage—all
can be weapons against violence, exclusion, hatred. Can we believe this
after what happened in France and
what can happen any day anywhere?
TF: In fact it proves that we need
more of it rather than less – we need
to understand each other better, so
that what happened in France can
be avoided. Perhaps what happened
in France is induced by a lack of appreciation of culture and of heritage,
and a lack of understanding that what
makes us different after all is just part
of the beauty of humanity.
“Tourism has a huge educational side to
it—both for the traveller and the people
of the traveller’s destination
2015
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