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The purpose of this article is to critically review the contributions made by the global trends issue participants on how tourism will impact people and planet and so provide answers to the strategic question defined for this global trends issue.

A content analysis of the papers selected was performed to identify the most significant ideas and proposals and how they may contribute to knowledge and/or professional practice.

As the tourism industry prepares to reach new records, there is a clear need to rethink tourism in the post COVID-19 era. The option of following a traditional pre-pandemic model of tourism development and growth is no longer productive, instead organizations and destinations must take the opportunity to develop a model where society takes center stage, the resources are used in a sustainable way and the results are distributed amongst all those involved in the tourism value chain.

In this concluding article the authors, supported by the views and proposals of the entire writing team, provide answers to the strategic question, thus demonstrating how tourism will affect people and planet in the short and medium terms.

In this article, the authors introduce the strategic question and demonstrate its relevance to society and for organizations. They also profile the articles selected for the annual global trends issue and explain how they illustrate the various angles on how tourism is impacting people and the planet.

The authors draw on a review of their previous research and other available information and on the articles selected to identify how tourism is impacting people and the planet. A brief explanation of the positions and proposals presented by the global trends issue authors as well as their key contributions is also presented.

From the analysis undertaken by the authors, it is clear that there is a need to rethink tourism in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic. This is even more important as the tourism industry has already recovered to 2019 levels (pre-pandemic performance) and is expected to break new records by the end of 2023. As the authors reach this milestone, the choice now is either to continue to follow the traditional pre-pandemic model of tourism development and growth or to take the opportunity to rethink where the tourism industry is heading and how it will impact people and the planet. The authors advocate for the second option, supported by research undertaken by the authors in recent years that clearly shows the favourable impact of tourism and why it must be treated and developed with society in mind. This involves use of resources in a sustainable way and distributing the outcomes among all those involved in the process.

In this introductory article, the authors contextualize the strategic question and demonstrate its relevance to society and for organizations. They also analyze the context of growth that the tourism industry has gone through since the end of 2022 and highlight the perspectives offered by a team of experts invited to reflect on the theme underlying the strategic question.

The purpose of the article is to present an innovative tool to support tourism managers and professionals in their decision-making process: the strategic agenda for tourism and the priorities for action.

In this article, the authors explain a process for developing a strategic agenda for tourism, how the themes were selected through a survey with a list of senior executives and later discussed and prioritized during the annual tourism conference convened by IPDT – Institute of Tourism.

The key findings were the top 10 themes/priorities for tourism planning and development as seen by the most senior tourism executives operating in Portugal, and how those themes can be explored to anticipate opportunities for companies and destinations.

This is the first agenda for tourism produced in Portugal with such a large group of senior executives from the tourism sector as the contributors. The project was deeply rooted in the experience and views of senior professionals operating in the tourism value chain, making it a reliable and up-to-date tool to support their decision-making processes.

The tourist industry has to adopt a big data-driven foresight approach to enhance decision-making in a post-COVID international landscape still marked by significant uncertainty and in which some megatrends have the potential to reshape society in the next decades. This paper, considering the opportunity offered by the application of the quantitative analysis on internet new data sources, proposes a prediction method using Google Trends data based on an estimated transfer function model.

The paper uses the time-series methods to model and predict Google Trends data. A transfer function model is used to transform the prediction of Google Trends data into predictions of tourist arrivals. It predicts the United States tourism demand in Italy.

The results highlight the potential expressed by the use of big data-driven foresight approach. Applying a transfer function model on internet search data, timely forecasts of tourism flows are obtained. The two scenarios emerged can be used in tourism stakeholders’ decision-making process. In a future perspective, the methodological path could be applied to other tourism origin markets, to other internet search engine or other socioeconomic and environmental contexts.

The study raises awareness of foresight literacy in the tourism sector. Secondly, it complements the research on tourism demand forecasting by evaluating the performance of quantitative forecasting techniques on new data sources. Thirdly, it is the first paper that makes the United States arrival predictions in Italy. Finally, the findings provide immediate valuable information to tourism stakeholders that could be used to make decisions.

The paper aims to explore how companies communicate their heritage by drawing on heritage marketing and corporate communications literature and mapping the corporate heritage communication strategies of iconic Italian brands.

The study adopts an inductive multiple case study approach, analysing the communication of corporate heritage by nine iconic Italian brands (Pastificio Lucio Garofalo, Barovier & Toso, Pasta Farina, Ducati, Amaro Montenegro, Fiat, Bonomelli, Olivetti and Illy).

In communicating corporate heritage, companies adopt different strategies that vary along two main dimensions – the subject of the story and the tone of voice of the content. The strategies are: (1) heritage for authenticity; (2) heritage for market leadership; and (3) heritage for continuity.

From a theoretical point of view, the study highlights that heritage marketing strategies vary according to underlying strategic themes and narrative approaches. From a managerial point of view, it offers a preliminary guide for the development of corporate heritage communications, also providing indications for their implementation.

This study is amongst the firsts to investigate the strategic antecedents that can shape corporate heritage communication strategies. It represents an integration of the existing literature, which is limited to the descriptive presentation of heritage marketing principles and tools.