Italy opens to international tourism within the EU

Italy’s Prime Minister Mario Draghi at the G20 Ministerial meeting on Tuesday relaunched Italian tourism and aid to the sector pending the reopening on 2 June and announces the European green pass, which will be ready from June. But Italy will anticipate a national Green Pass from the second half of May so he extended the invitation to book holidays.

Italy is ready to welcome the world again, tourism will come back strong as the prime minister bets, speaking at the thematic event of the G20 “Hosting visitors to travel without quarantine safely says it will be possible again so the time has come to book your holidays in Italy and of course we can’t wait to welcome you again” Draghi said.

“We must offer European citizens clear and simple rules to travel safely” underlines Mario Draghi, “for this reason it is essential that there will be the introduction of the European Green Pass expected for the second half of June,” Draghi said “Pending the European certificate, which we hope will come as soon as possible.

The Italian government has introduced a national green pass that will allow people to move freely between regions and which will come into force from the second half of May”.

The government will provide help in the next decree to the tourism industry which has been hit hard by the pandemic. An important part of the recovery plan will be dedicated to the sector, conscious and sustainable tourism that respects the environment and inclusive of local communities.

What are the guidelines decided by the tourism ministers of the G20 for the environment and local communities? The restart of tourism is fundamental for the global recovery, and one of the sectors hardest hit by Covid-19. In 2020 tourist arrivals plunged by 73% globally almost 62 million jobs were lost, and the prospects remain very uncertain.

The details were drawn from the final document of the G20 of the ministers of tourism in Rome and the 6 guidelines that stand out will trace the future of world tourism revival.

· Safe mobility – which means freedom to move between countries but with the safety given by vaccines

· Crisis management – with common and special measures to overcome emergencies

· Resilience – which means tenacious resistance in defence of tourism inclusiveness the right of all citizens to share in the benefits of the sector

· Green Transition – Respect for the environment

· Digital Transition – which at a global level is a sort of acceleration for European countries to be in line with the nextgeneration.eu plan.

· Infrastructure investments. 

The Italian Tourism Minister said “finally we start again, it has already restarted nationally because reservations are already there and are also important at the national level but what matters is also restarting foreign tourism. Last year not having foreigners in our country made us lose 28 billion Euros, which 1,5% of the GDP”.

“The Green Pass will arrive from mid-June, but we anticipate it and therefore from the beginning of June we are ready to receive everyone” the minister also said “Italians are able to travel freely within Italy this summer, I have seen the numbers of bookings which are growing every day. People can travel with a simple swab or rather with vaccination if they have done it already”. F

What about Italians who want to go abroad? “We have a general common rule which we discussed today in the G20, the so-called it Green Pass which includes the most important three rules’ travellers must have to travel abroad:

1. Travelers must be Vaccination

2. People that have recovered from Covid-19 and have the antibodies

3. Or have a negative swab

Italy is currently trying to come out of the third wave of the pandemic that appeared to have peaked in late March, with the curve slowly going down. Across the country, only 9 percent of the population is fully vaccinated, and 12 percent partially, although most of the country regions are now in the yellow zone and restrictions have been eased.