Many UNWTO Member States have placed tourism as a priority in their national development agenda.  This has led to a significant increase in requests for UNWTO technical assistance in developing or improving quality standards – particularly, through the development and implementation of hotel classification schemes.

A well-structured and smoothly operated hotel classification scheme is very beneficial to a tourism destination in that it creates a true culture of quality among the accommodation industry; increases the competitiveness of the hotel industry in line with international best practices; and can be used as a tool for marketing and promotion of the destination.

UNWTO technical assistance in hotel classification focuses on three areas:

•    Formulating the hotel classification criteria according to international best practices;
•    Training of national assessors to conduct inspections; and
•    Implementing the hotel classification system.

To date, in 2016, UNWTO has launched three new projects on hotel classification: Andorra (funded by the Ministry of Tourism and Trade), the Republic of Congo (with UNDP funding) and Seychelles (funded by the Ministry of Tourism and Culture).  In addition, at the request of the Government of Tunisia, through the Ministry of Tourism and Handicrafts, UNWTO conducted a needs assessment mission to guide the Government on improvements to be made to their hotel classification system.