Over 60 participants from the Taiwan tourism industry, especially hotels and tour operators, attended a special one day workshop on child protection as part of responsible tourism.
The event was sponsored by the Taiwan Tourism Bureau and the Ministry of Transportation and Communication with the support of ECPAT Taiwan.
Key presentations were on the issue of commercial sexual exploitation of children in Taiwan; introduction to The Code; the principles of child protection in tourism and the role of the industry, and a sharing of lessons learned from ACCOR’s corporate social responsibility actions on child protection.
In the afternoon, the workshop included a lively panel discussion moderated by Ms. Ingrid Liao, Vice Chair of ECPAT Taiwan with the following speakers: Mr. Christophe Lejeune, Regional Director Human Resources ACCOR Asia, Mr. Andreas Astrup, General Manager of The Code, Mr. Alfred Yin-Hsiu Hsu, Chairperson of the Hotel Association Representative and Ms. Patchareeboon Sakulpitakphon, Project Manager of The Code.
As a result of the workshop, tourism professionals made strong request to the Taiwan Tourism Bureau and the Hotel Association for further guidance and protocols regarding identification checking procedures and assistance in networking with key agencies and NGOs for additional support.
For follow-up, ECPAT Taiwan and The Code will continue to support the tourism companies in taking action to protect children.