Accor to ban all single-use plastics by end 2022

Accor has vowed to remove all single-use plastic items from its hotels by end-2022, as it joins the Global Tourism Plastics Initiative led by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the World Tourism Organization, in collaboration with the Ellen MacArthur Foundation.

The move is part of the hotel group’s efforts towards reducing environmental impacts and strengthening efforts to combat plastic pollution of the world’s oceans and other natural environments.

Accor pledges to ban all single-use plastics from its hotels by end-2022

“Plastic pollution is one of the major environmental challenges of our time, and tourism has an important role to play in contributing to the solution,” said UNEP economy division director, Ligia Noronha.

“Through the Global Tourism Plastics Initiative, tourism companies and destinations are supported to innovate, eliminate, and circulate the way they use plastics, to advance circularity in our economies and reduce plastics pollution globally.”

In addition to Accor’s previous commitment to eliminate all plastic straws, stirrers and cotton buds, the company has also committed to the removal of individual plastic toiletry amenities and cups by the end of 2020, as well as the elimination of all remaining single-use plastic items in guestrooms, meeting areas, restaurants and all leisure activities areas (spas, fitness centres, etc.) by the end of 2022.

Relevant alternatives to plastic will be proposed for each specific item, considering Life Cycle Assessments to ensure better environmental performance for the solution proposed to its hotels, said Accor in a statement.

In addition, several Accor hotels within the group’s portfolio of brands – including Novotel Yangon Max, Myanmar; Sofitel Bogota; many hotels in Bali and Lombok, Indonesia; Ibis Styles São Paulo Anhem – have already taken steps individually to be plastic-free and are advancing towards a 100 per cent single-use plastic free objective.

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