UPDATE: Project details updated during the EPSA 2025-26 edition. Awarded Special Recognition for continuous improvement and long-term sustainability.
The Destination Barcelona project came about as a result of two main factors. First, tourism policies over the last 20 years favoured a process of extending tourism across the region with the development of inland areas as tourist destinations in themselves (part of a strategy of territorial rebalancing and socio-economic development). Second, the overwhelming success of the city of Barcelona as a tourist destination. Fewer than 1.7 million tourists were accommodated in the city’s hotels in 1990, which reached 9 million by 2015; overnight stays over the same period leaped from 3.8 million to 19.1 million.
Given this scenario, Destination Barcelona is tackling two main challenges:
- How to regionally decentralise tourism from the city of Barcelona and consider Barcelona as a destination that goes beyond the administrative limits of the city. This should address the signs of overload and the conflicts arising as a consequence of unplanned growth based on limited resources concentrated in certain neighbourhoods.
- How to articulate a competitive tourism offering beyond the city of Barcelona, yet which takes advantage of the values of the Barcelona brand. This entails expanding the geographical and symbolic dimensions of Barcelona and placing value on new attractions, services and facilities outside the city of Barcelona.
The general objective of Destination Barcelona is to take advantage of the current tourism dynamic as an asset for local economic development. The social, economic and environmental impact of the growth of tourism needs to take into account regional balance, the redistribution of the wealth generated, carrying capacity, the creation of jobs and the sustainability of the model itself. The aim is to establish a win-win situation, with the city of Barcelona seeing its tourism offering diversified and increased. The province of Barcelona will then improve its tourist positioning through its association with a consolidated brand that is recognised worldwide.
At an operational level, this translates into two main working areas:
- The institutional collaboration between Barcelona Provincial Council, Barcelona Municipal Council and the Turisme de Barcelona Consortium through collaboration agreements. This would be in the fields of promotion, product creation, tourist information and the creation of tourist intelligence that have facilitated a framework of collaboration to progressively align strategies, promotional actions and destination management.
- The institutional collaboration between Barcelona Provincial Council and local authorities in the province to develop policies to promote and stimulate regional tourism and hence improve the tourism offering and position it in both national and international markets. Given the regional and municipal diversity, this collaboration has been orchestrated through intermunicipal tourist structures (at a county level) and materialised in the form of programme contracts as a strategic management instrument rolled out in four-year phases.
With regard to the results, it should be highlighted that the Destination Barcelona agreement allows the joint development of statistics and surveys on tourist supply and demand (joint annual Statistics and Report), the creation of a joint Observatory on tourism in Barcelona and its counties, joint and complementary promotional actions in the different outgoing markets, the inclusion of county-related products on the Barcelona marketing platform, the Barcelona is Much More web portal (397 841 visits in 2016) and the merger of the two Barcelona Convention Bureau (business tourism).
Developments
EPSA 2017 awarded the Barcelona Destination initiative, a pioneering inter-institutional collaboration between the Barcelona Provincial Council and the City of Barcelona, to promote sustainable tourism within the Barcelona province.
The governance system has evolved and expanded. One of the most representative results of this cooperation has been the implementation of a common sustainable tourism programme, the Destination Barcelona Commitment to Sustainable Tourism (DBCST). It has the aim to reinforce tourism sustainability among private sector and public entities on the basis of a rigorous and pioneer methodology providing specialised advice for improving sustainable practices, training sessions, and forums for generating synergies among programme members. DBCST has a holistic and integral approach including the whole destination with special attention to SMEs, addressed to companies, services, and public bodies of the province of Barcelona that wish to improve their sustainable tourism management and their positioning within the tourism sector. So far, 1199 companies and tourism services are engaged in the programme, leading the destination to the three-field sustainability with indicators measuring economic, environmental, and social sustainability. It does so by basing its methodology on the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the United Nations 2030 Agenda.
The most relevant development is the creation and consolidation of a shared methodology for sustainability that recognises the sector effort towards sustainability criteria, originally designed between 2019 and 2020 and further updated since. This methodology defines clear criteria aligned with the SDGs, introduces sector-specific 21 Good Practice Manuals, requires annual commitments, and establishes a common set of sustainability indicators. A digital platform supports monitoring and reporting, while accredited consultants provide annual verification and tailored guidance.
The collaboration between the Diputació (provincial council) and the City of Barcelona has been significantly strengthened. The methodology of DBCST was originally created by Diputació de Barcelona in 2017 and in 2019, the city formally adopted it. Both institutions jointly redefined the framework, integrating new criteria on climate action, accessibility, labour standards, social inclusion, and cultural identity. This alignment has eliminated previous fragmentation and has created a unified governance system shared across municipalities, counties, and the metropolitan area.
The DBCST programme has expanded its operational capacity: technical teams have been reinforced, a permanent Sustainability Board has been established, and long-term planning cycles have been introduced. New coordination mechanisms with the Chamber of Commerce and specialised consultancies have improved efficiency, quality control, and technical soundness.
Participation has also grown substantially over the years: from 245 distinguished companies in 2017, to a total of 1199 member companies in 2025. In the Barcelona Destination project, among them tourism businesses, cultural institutions, natural parks, tourism events, public services, and destination management entities now adhere to the DBCST programme.
Overall, the project has progressed from a recognition-based initiative to a mature, fully integrated destination-wide sustainability governance model, shifting from isolated best practices to a collective, measurable, and accountable sustainability culture, while reinforcing the Barcelona Destination brand with a strong, long-term commitment to responsibility and continuous improvement.
Long-term impact
Over the years, the programme has not only met but significantly expanded the objectives set in 2017. DBCST has transformed sustainability from a voluntary aspiration into a structural requirement, fully embedded in tourism management practices across the destination and the sector.
Tourism organisations now integrate sustainability systematically through annual improvement plans, verification reports, and continuous advisory support. This has generated measurable progress in key areas such as energy efficiency, waste reduction, circular economy practices, accessibility, local supply chains, cultural heritage integration, and community relations.
One of the programme’s most notable achievements is the diversification of its accredited members. By 2025, it had brought together 1200 companies and entities across the province of Barcelona, covering the full tourism value chain. While tourist accommodation providers remain the largest group, the programme has expanded well beyond traditional sectors to include restaurants, cultural facilities, destinations, and tourist offices, as well as non-traditional actors such as wineries, beaches and marinas, natural protected areas, sports events, tourist experiences, meetings, incentives, conferences, and exhibitions services, wellness providers, and transport operators. This reflects a holistic and inclusive approach to sustainable tourism.
The programme is accessible to companies of all sizes, with a strong presence of micro and small enterprises alongside medium-sized and large organisations. This diversity is supported by a robust capacity-building framework, including tailored advisory services, group sessions, training activities, and continuous communication, enabling the practical transfer of sustainability solutions and peer learning across the sector.
At the destination level, the alignment between the City and the Province of Barcelona has consolidated a coherent governance model, reducing duplication and strengthening policy consistency. Building on the governance framework recognised by EPSA in 2017, the DBCST has evolved into a resilient, long-term institutional structure, positioning Barcelona Destination, province, and city, as a leading reference in sustainable tourism governance.
Adjustment in the objectives
Since 2017, the programme has responded to an evolving context and increasing ambition at destination level. An initiative to promote responsible tourism and good practices evolved into an improvement framework, based on annual commitments, actions, and results.
The programme reflects a holistic approach to sustainability, aligned with the SDGs. Its scope includes climate mitigation and adaptation, circular economy, accessibility, social inclusion, cultural identity, decent work, and community well-being, positioning sustainability transversally across tourism policy and management.
In 2025, member entities were required to report through the programme’s platform on three key environmental indicators: water consumption, energy consumption, and carbon footprint. This requirement strengthened environmental monitoring and supported decision-making. The programme delivered targeted training workshops on carbon footprint calculation, providing tools for measurement, monitoring, and continuous improvement.
The programme integrates evaluation mechanisms: a survey among members shows that organisations value the support for structured sustainability management and the recognition and visibility. These results highlight the added value of public administration leadership in coordinating a sustainability framework and reinforcing public–private collaboration.
Beyond tourism, the programme has generated spillover effects in areas as event sustainability, mobility planning, cultural management, natural heritage protection, and local economic development, consolidating the DBCST as a transversal governance model.