During the 2022 PATA Gold Awards Ceremony held virtually on October 7, 2022, the Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA) announced the
winners of the 2022 PATA Gold Awards. Proudly supported and sponsored by the Macao Government Tourism Office (MGTO) for the last 27 years, this year’s awards recognise the achievements of 25 organisations and individuals. An in-person Gold Awards presentation ceremony will be held during the upcoming PATA Annual Summit to occur in Ras Al Khaimah, UAE (located 45 minutes from Dubai) on October 26-27.
PATA presented 23 Gold Awards to such organisations as The Ascott Limited, Singapore; Cinnamon Hotels & Resorts; Designated Areas for Sustainable Tourism Administration (DASTA); Faithworks Studios; Forte Hotel Group; Gangwon Tourism Organization; Jetwing Hotels; John Borthwick; Keelung City Government; Kerala Tourism; Korea Tourism Organization; Macao Government Tourism Office; Macao Institute for Tourism Studies; Marianas Visitors Authority; Nepal Tourism Board; Sands China; Sarawak Tourism Board; SriLankan Airlines; Tourism Authority of Thailand; Tourism Fiji; Tourism Malaysia; TTG Asia Media, and Quantcast.
Under the guidance of PATA headquarters, 12 independent judges from around the world selected the winners of the 23 Gold Awards and two Grand Title Winners.
Maria Helena de Senna Fernandes, Director of MGTO, said, “This year’s PATA Gold Awards winners reveal once again the power of creativity and responsibility of Asia-Pacific region tourism stakeholders to enable our industry not only to survive but to thrive. Macao is glad to join hands with PATA to bring to centre stage these positive initiatives as we look forward to the normalization of safe travel.”
PATA CEO Liz Ortiguera added, “On behalf of PATA, I would like to extend our sincerest congratulations to all PATA Gold Award winners and Grand Title winners, and I would also like to thank all of this year’s participants. The achievements of this year’s winners will hopefully inspire and encourage our industry to create new responsible and sustainable initiatives as we look towards recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic. It was a pleasure to celebrate their accomplishments live during the online PATA Gold Awards Presentation.”
The PATA Grand Title Winners were presented with outstanding entries in two principal categories: Marketing, and Sustainability and Social Responsibility.
The Hong Kong Tourism Board (HKTB) received the PATA Gold Award 2022 Grand Title in Marketing for its “Hong Kong Neighbourhoods – West Kowloon campaign. Although West Kowloon Cultural District housed Hong Kong’s newest art museums, cultural attractions, and creative spaces, it lacked a local community to give local personality and authenticity. To tell a more interesting story, the Hong Kong Tourism Board ran a Neighbourhoods campaign that expanded the district into the surrounding older districts, creating a contrast of new and old cultural traditions. They called this the West Kowloon Neighbourhoods – Creating Modern Traditions. They aimed to put people first and highlight the stories of people behind living traditions. This campaign marks HKTB’s first step in pioneering a more sustainable mode of tourism. Learnings from this campaign will serve as guardrails for future campaign design, ensuring that they start with engaging the local community, going beyond preserving traditions to creating new ones, and driving long-term socio-economic benefit back to the local community itself.
The Grand Title in Sustainability and Social Responsibility was presented to Wynn Macau, Limited, for its “Wynn Sustainability Initiatives”. As a member of the tourism and hospitality sector, Wynn understands the importance of waste reduction at source and is always looking for innovative solutions to reduce institutional, food, and energy consumption. In recent years, Wynn has adopted a number of new environmental technologies, including becoming the first integrated resort in Macau to jointly develop an automated filtered water bottling system with Nordaq, significantly reducing plastic waste and carbon footprint. To help tackle the global food loss and waste issue, they adopted a life cycle approach (Sustainable Food Life Cycle Journey), a series of programs and strategies that include responsible food sourcing, menu design, building green culture, and applying world-class innovative technology. Wynn is also the first integrated resort in Macau to introduce the Winnow Vision which provides data-driven insights through AI-machine learning technology. This data enables the creation of the Food Donations and Upcycling Program with local social enterprises which is the first of its kind in Macau.
