Playing a key role in shaping the future of tourism, the project uses financial investment to support sustainable, community-enhancing initiatives. It provides flexible and affordable capital to entrepreneurs and businesses that maximise the positive impact of tourism for local communities. It also sets a clear example for other foundations and investors to follow by demonstrating that investing in locally owned, community-enhancing, environmentally positive tourism businesses brings positive impact and financial sustainability.
As well as accounting for approximately 10% of global GDP, tourism also creates around 10% of jobs around the world, and more worryingly, 10% of emissions, too. This makes it an incredibly powerful lever for economic, social and environmental change. Alongside this, whilst the recent COVID-19 pandemic presented unprecedented challenges to the travel and tourism industry, it also provided the opportunity to learn, rethink, and reset.
Which is why UnTours Foundation created the Reset Tourism Fund and teamed up with the TUI Care Foundation’s Impact Fund – to invest in the next generation of tourism businesses and work together to build a better future for the industry.
The Fund provides flexible and affordable capital to entrepreneurs and businesses that maximise the positive impact of tourism for local communities, employees, the natural environment and for tourists themselves. Offering a unique opportunity for small tourism businesses to grow and create jobs, the target is to invest in 15 local businesses based in tourism destinations around the world. A key focus is on under-represented groups in tourism business ownership (including women, ethnic and racial minorities), and social enterprises that have a specific community or environmental impact built into their business model.
Working collaboratively, the TUI Care Foundation and UnTours Foundation build the investment pipeline, make investment decisions and provide follow-up support to investees, including technical support and mentoring. The partnership leverages UnTours Foundation’s experience in creative, catalytic investing with the power of the TUI and TUI Care Foundation ecosystem, which offers access to markets, shared knowledge and professional mentoring expertise. Funds are invested and subsequently reinvested as capital becomes available again throughout the project period.
PROJECT PARTNER
UnTours Foundation’s mission is to unleash capital and kindness to nurture ideas and build healthy, sustainable communities. The Foundation works to alleviate poverty by providing low-interest loans and flexible investments to social entrepreneurs and businesses, both across the United States and around the world. Its capital creates employment and valuable goods and services in economically impoverished communities and the Foundation seeks to fuel projects that are leading-edge, replicable, and green. By investing rather than giving grants, UnTours Foundation recycles its resources, making capital available again and again to visionary investees.
