WORLDWIDE: Marriott International has launched a meetings programme designed to help meeting planners embed sustainability into their events.
Connect Responsibly with Marriott Bonvoy Events (Connect Responsibly) plans to offer meetings and events customers, at participating hotels in the Marriott Bonvoy portfolio, access to detailed Meeting Impact Reports to measure the environmental impact of their events and select options to purchase carbon credits.
Erika Alexander, chief global officer, global operations, Marriott International said: “There is nothing like connecting in person, and doing so responsibly makes it that much better.
“With the Connect Responsibly program, we are giving our meetings and events customers options to better understand the impacts of their meetings as we collectively strive to create a more resilient future for travel”.
The Meeting Impact Report is available after the event has taken place and is intended to capture event details, property-specific sustainability practices implemented for the event, and the event’s carbon and water footprints.
This is calculated through established hospitality industry methodologies such as the World Sustainable Hospitality Alliance’s hotel carbon measurement initiative.
As a global launch, Marriott expects the Meeting Impact Report to be available in 11 different languages based on location.
To offset meetings and events Marriott is working with South Pole, a carbon asset developer and climate consultancy.
Through the Meeting Impact Report, customers will have the option to use the South Pole online shop to choose from a range of carbon offset projects – verified by independent third-party organisations – that can be purchased as part of their event.
Tammy Routh, SVP global sales, Marriott International said: “We are excited to build on our sustainability reporting capabilities to provide our meetings and events customers with detailed Meeting Impact Reports and offer access to a select portfolio of verified carbon offset projects, through our collaboration with South Pole.”
As of April 2024, Marriott was the largest global hospitality company to receive approval from the Science Based Targets initiative for both near-term and long-term science-based emissions reduction targets (SBTs).
The Connect Responsibly programme is anticipated to go live at managed and franchised properties from participating brands globally by the end of October.
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