Accessibility as Both Social Responsibility and Market Issue

Accessibility is understood as the conditions that environments, products, and services must have to meet the needs of all people, including those with disabilities. In numbers, 16% of the population benefits directly from accessibility, even with a temporary disability such as having to use crutches. However, indirect benefits reach 40% of the world's population (people with obesity, pregnant women, and people who have suffered an accident, to name a few).

According to the WHO in 2023, the world population with a disability is a figure that is increasing due to the aging of the population and the increase of chronic diseases. In Latin America and the Caribbean, 1 in 3 households has at least one person with a disability (World Bank, 2021). That is 85 million people with disabilities. 

Ana Clara Rucci, an accessibility expert, presents some enlightening data on the problem and the market. While it is true that people with disabilities incur higher expenses in care, medication, and costs associated with transportation and rehabilitation, there are studies that indicate that 37% of people with disabilities in Germany decided not to travel due to the lack of accessibility in the facilities, while 48% would be willing to travel more frequently if it were accessible and that reliable and updated information on tourist destinations is a determining factor. It is also true that people with disabilities will not risk moving from one place to another if they do not know in advance if they will be able to enjoy the places, move around the destination, among others. 

According to a survey of people with and without disabilities in Spain (ONCE Foundation, 2017), they mainly choose to travel within the country (60%) while there is a small percentage only to foreign countries (4%), and 36% decide to travel within the country and abroad interchangeably. 

The most important factors for choosing a destination for a person with a disability are tourist interest and economic criteria, coinciding with people without disabilities. However, the third factor is “that it is accessible and adapted to their needs,” a factor considered for people with physical disabilities while people without disabilities do not consider it as a differentiating factor when choosing a destination. 

Considering that certain disabilities require certain care and, many times, transportation is the main constraint to move or, if something risky were to happen in a country other than the one where the tourist comes from where the medical care system, language, or other issues are not known, even more, tourists with disabilities will choose domestic tourism. 

A study of accessible tourism in Peru indicates that these people generally travel with family and friends, since they require some assistance, and that they travel in low seasons. They also have a higher average expenditure, coinciding with other authors, and that they stay in four- and five-star hotels. 

Likewise, 56% of people with disabilities decide not to travel because they understand that there is no accessible and adequate tourism offer for them. 

What does Mexico have and what should Smart Tourist Destinations and Magical Towns do?

Despite the fact that the regulatory framework in terms of federal, state, and municipal tourism contemplates accessible tourism, this has not been implemented in many of Mexico's Magical Towns. The fact that municipal regulations barely contemplate accessibility and disability, has resulted in its lack of implementation and the voluntary and non-mandatory nature of its application, a fact that is evident in the conditions of road accessibility, transportation, or buildings.

What is the key to make progress in accessibility in the Magical Towns?

1. Normative Framework: To have regulations and technical manuals of accessibility.

2. Accessibility Management: Technical training for municipal officials, information in Braille, sign language, and for the private sector, the provision of services.

3. Implementation of Accessibility in Public Spaces: Improvement of narrow sidewalks, better location of urban furniture, adequate slopes, mapping for accessibility diagnosis.

4. Technological Accessibility: To have a regulation that makes it obligatory to incorporate accessibility in digital information media.

What about Smart Tourist Destinations? 

The Smart Tourist Destinations, according to its UNE 178501:2018 Standard, has an accessibility pillar among its five pillars. This pillar is one of the least developed in the fulfillment of requirements and indications. In the self-diagnosis carried out within the framework of the Ibero-American Network of Smart Tourist Destinations, 41 destinations were at 40% compliance with this pillar.

Accessibility is part of non-technological intelligence; no destination can have intelligent management if it does not balance corporate social responsibility, public responsibility, and business models for the destination's entrepreneurs, providing the community and tourists with comfort and profitability.

Accessibility in Mexico has been treated mostly as a social responsibility issue, not as a market issue. Both are compatible and enhance each other. It is time to think differently about this issue and act accordingly.