OPENING ADDRESS BY THE MINISTER FOR TOURISM

OPENING ADDRESS BY THE HON. MICHAEL REFALO, MINISTER FOR TOURISM, AT THE MALTA INSTITUTE OF WASTE MANAGEMENT SEMINAR ON "WASTE MANAGEMENT AND THE HOSPITALITY INDUSTRY" AT THE RADISSON SAS BAYPOINT RESORT, ST. JULIANS

I thank you very much for inviting me to open this seminar which focuses on an area of vital importance to tourism. I am pleased to underline that this occasion has come about as a result of meetings and agreement reached between the Institute and the Hotels and Catering Establishments Board.

This proves that, despite the fact that HCEB daily draws nearer to the end of its legal existence, the members who sit on the Board continue to give an extremely valid and determining contribution to the orderly organisation and wellbeing of the tourist industry.

A direct effect of an expanding tourist industry is that it stimulates growth. Within it, around it and directly as well as indirectly, because of it. As the old Latin adage teaches "repetita juvat", it pays to repeat, and even if needs be for the umpteenth time, I repeat and emphasize the contribution which tourism makes to the national economy: 25 % to GDP, 22 % to government revenue, the equivalent of one job in three on the employment market and much more.

Tourism is our lifeblood. However before one prostrates oneself before the industry's altar or even misguidedly, prostitutes oneself totally and blindly in the industry's economic interests, I believe that one must take a good, hard look at the possibly not so shining reverse side of the coin.

A further direct effect of the demands of the industry's growth is reflected in the construction industry's expansion. Old buildings are demolished and new and bigger ones built in their stead. New roads leading to and utilities servicing new hotels and facilities create further waste and debris, and exert new pressures and stresses on a sometimes inadequate infrastructure network. The social fabric is put under strain, often followed by cultural degradation and the possible generation of untenable levels of human pollution, noise and waste.

No, I do not make a case against the industry's further expansion, or against the building of new facilities, such as golf courses, but a strong argument for the industry's better management. Not just better management of hotels and catering establishments and what is traditionally and sometimes simplistically considered within a narrow interpretation of the tourism industry, but to the consequences and side effects of unplanned, unmonitored, loosely regulated expansion.

I have no doubt that many of you have studied and possibly contributed to the drafting of the proposals set out in the Works Department's Solid Waste Plan for Malta. I will not labour you with the mountains of statistical information which you know but will only remind you that a good 75% of our visitors zero in to two main tourism zones: Bugibba, Qawra, St. Paul's Bay and Sliema, St. Julians, Pembroke, equidistant from the unsightly Maghtab mountain, the nation's dumping ground.

Is this sole statistic not sufficient an argument to suggest the dump's closure? Its relocation? To prompt another search for less unsightly, less visually and environmentally damaging alternatives? Is this not a good enough case for the Planning Authority to rethink its opposition to sea reclamation? To have a second and, if needs be, a third look at the plusses and minuses of similar solutions?

However before the industry and I begin, or continue, to point fingers and blame others, the industry should have a good look at itself and examine its collective and individual conscience. So, apart from calculating the contribution which tourism makes to the national economy, consider also the contribution which the industry, through its expansion, has made to the Maghtab mountain.

I believe it is also worth the industry's while to dwell on the lack of contribution which some hotels and the majority of restaurants make to the Sant Antnin plant. On Tuesday, as I made the concluding remarks at MTA's launch of Hospitality Assured, I said, and on the basis of the "repetita juvat" principle I say it again, that all one needs to do to make discernible and very positive difference, is more investment in thought and much shedding of egoism.

Just imagine the reduction in the Maghtab problem had contractors, who depend so much on tourism for their livelihood, kept to the laws and regulations? Just think what a difference it would make if hotel and restaurant swill was processed and channeled to farms and fields through the Sant Antnin plant rather than clandestinely and untreated direct to pig farms? Or through an over-burdened domestic waste collection system, sometimes left to rot in and around skips?

I can safely state that the vast majority of catering establishments avail themselves illegally of the domestic waste collection system. This results from the Ministry's survey of tourism localities. The Ministry has also met tourist area Local Councils, skip operators and the GRTU to establish a uniform code for the use of skips. Some Local Councils have issued bye-laws, others have not, and even where bye laws exist there is little consistency.

By the time licences are renewed for 2001 the Malta Tourism Authority's complete manpower structure should be in place and will be in a position to take over administration and enforcement from HCEB. It is therefore of the essence that licence conditions should mandatorily include that only authorised swill collectors should be contracted to collect swill from hotels and catering establishments. Likewise, to prevent the blockage of mains drains, all catering establishments must be equipped with a functioning grease trap.

I know that the Malta Hotels and Restaurants Association is in discussions with the Ministry for the Environment pressing for a more orderly and rational collection system. I trust that we will soon see waste in hotels and catering establishments separated into biodegradable, organic and non-organic waste. That glass and paper and other potentially recyclable waste is separately stored, collected, and processed.

What I have just mentioned only skims the surface of what needs to be done. I conclude my address this morning not just by thanking you for bringing this subject up for debate on the nation's agenda but also to remind all operators and every Maltese and Gozitan who earns his living from an expanding leisure and hospitality industry that, for expansion to be translated into social, cultural, environmental success it must first and foremost be founded on one basic and fundamental consideration : that for the foreseeable future success in tourism will depend principally on the environment.

It will depend on our will and ability to translate the many good intentions about environmental protection into action: and on the application and enforcement of the right policies and measures for the preservation and enhancement of the natural and man made environment. This is the sine qua non for Malta's long term survival in the competitive world of Mediterranean and global tourism.