It has been a lengthy development process. To put it in perspective, it took the founders of the now successful World Travel & Tourism Council eleven years from vision to getting the industry’s corporate Chairman around a table and each to agree to write a $50,000 check. It took the World Tourism Organization thirteen years from concept to reality to gain its invaluable affiliation with the United Nations. It has taken the International Institute of Peace through Tourism twenty years to gain world momentum. To further add to the perspective, Tourism, as a lightly recognized “industry,” began only 50 years ago following World War II and the advent of the jet engine.

The roots of the World Tourism Network go back to 1971 as mainframe technologies were entering the industry. The emergence the PC/Mac in the eighties and the Web in the nineties made it technologically and economically possible. In 1995, World Tourism Foundation, Inc. was incorporated to serve as the development entity for the non-profit “World Tourism Foundation” and the for-profit “World Tourism Network.” World Tourism Foundation, Inc. is owned by individual destination, supplier, technology, and academic leaders (which will be transferred to WTN). This base capitalization has been supplemented the past decade via the on-going resources of vested partners. In addition Cj Duffy, Chairman of World Tourism Foundation, Inc. has funded the administrative overhead since 1996.

Several hundred tourism, technology, and academic leaders from around the world have quietly developed the product, pricing, and promotion strategies. The Founding Trustees of the WTF represent a geographical balance of recognized global tourism leaders. The Boards of ten global and regional tourism leadership organizations have signed Memorandums of Understanding agreeing to designate the WTF Brand as the industry’s globally shared brand. Of the government-supported/supplier-endorsed DMOs approached in concept beta testing, 100% have expressed interest in participating in a global network of their peers. Of the travel Tech Vendors approached, including some of the largest and the leading pioneers, 95% have agreed to invest the resources to construct a transactional interface into WTN on behalf of their supplier clients.

The World Tourism Network and the World Tourism Foundation sit in an intellectual and political state of virtual turn-key readiness. Its rollout timing has required inordinate levels of patience and bold leadership. The hardest part of development has been “The Wait” for the alignment of external conditions. The Wait has included:

• The acknowledgement by tourism leaders that the adverse events we are experiencing are not going away.
• A political readiness among tourism organizations that the industry must create its own source of major funding to address the escalating issues.
• Thorough experimentation of the Internet medium by DMOs worldwide.
• Supplier adoption in mass of the web-based inventory management tools.
• Visitor confidence in making purchases online.
• World Leader recognition of tourism’s essential role on the world.