The Global Business Travel Association Foundation this week released a set of what it calls standards for sustainable lodging procurement. It's the group's second set of such standards; the foundation released standards for sustainable aviation procurement in March.
The standards include a bank of 50 questions designed for buyers to consider including in their lodging requests for proposals, giving hoteliers the opportunity to answer a standardized set of sustainability questions. Not all the questions in the standards are designed to be in a company's RFP, rather, the intent is for buyers to consider which questions are best suited to their own organizations' sustainability goals.
The lodging standards include questions on hotel environmental, social and governance policies, plans, and targets, as well as the hotel's certificates and sustainability accreditations. It also includes questions on individual property carbon emissions, as measured in CO2 equivalent emissions per room per night.
The standards include questions on other environmental factors, including the hotel's energy consumption, water use, waste management approach, food and beverage—including the availability of plant-based meals—as well as the availability of electric vehicle charging stations, as well as the biodiversity of its amenities and operations.
Beyond sustainability, the standards also include questions on the hotel's approach to human rights, diversity, equity, and inclusion, and its investments in its community.
In contrast with the questions in the aviation standards, many of which were open-ended, the vast majority of the hotel questions—43 of the 50—can be answered by the hotel with a "yes" or "no" answer. Four require a number to answer, including emissions and water use information, with only three open-ended, including requests to detail the hotels ESG objectives and sustainability accreditation held.
The standards, where applicable, also show alignment with other industry RFP and sustainability tools, including those provided by Cvent and HRS, the World Travel and Tourism Council, Travalyst and the Global Sustainable Tourism Council.
"With more and more travel programs incorporating sustainability goals into their supplier relationships, and with hotel procurement becoming more complex every year, it is imperative that buyers have a straightforward way to analyze the sustainability performance of their hotel suppliers," the GBTA Foundation said in a procurement guide that accompanies the standards. The foundation suggested that "travel management companies and others who are supporting buyers in this effort should also align their scorecards and procurement guidance with the Sustainable Procurement Standards."
The standards are available on the GBTA Foundation web site. One need not be a GBTA member to download them.