Trade Associations:An Appropriate Channel for Developing Sustainable Practice in SMEs?

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), particularly the micro-enterprise, dominate the tourism industry numerically, and play a key role in delivering quality experiences to the tourist. Yet research by Hillary (2000) suggested that SMEs from all the economic sectors are responsible for around 70% of total industrial pollution. Strategic papers for the tourism sector in the United Kingdom refer to the promotion of emerging trade association activity in influencing SMEs' environmental behaviour. This paper examines the results of a postal survey of United Kingdom trade associations to assess their role in developing sustainable practice amongst SME tourism businesses. Responses from 17 national trade associations with a tourism-related membership coverage of around 12,500 SMEs suggested that only a small minority regarded meeting environmental criteria or signing up to an environmental code of conduct as compulsory requirements of membership, whereas there was more activity for different types of voluntary initiative, often through the aid of partnerships. Overall, there was less leadership from trade associations than was seemingly portrayed in the strategic documents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]