Every winter, visitors to Sapporo, Japan can watch a public square evolve from one use to another.

In December, the square serves residents: seniors chat on benches, vendors set up stalls, kids cut across on their way to school. By February, the same square anchors Sapporo’s annual Snow Festival, welcoming visitors from around the world.

That transformation captures a simple truth: the most resilient tourism destinations are great places to visit because they’re great places to live.

Learning from Japan: Building Tourism that Lasts

Recognizing the importance of resilient tourism, the World Bank Group's Tokyo Development Learning Center hosted a technical deep dive workshop on cities’ roles in enabling tourism and jobs in December 2025.

The workshop brought together officials from Albania, Argentina, the Dominican Republic, Indonesia, Kenya, Mozambique, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka to learn from international and Japanese tourism leaders, World Bank Group tourism experts, and each other.

From Kyoto's preserved streets to the regeneration of Sapporo and Otaru, we explored how cities can leverage their assets, diversify their offer, and grow tourism where there is under-realized potential for tourism to enhance livability. We also discussed tactics for managing the challenges of a booming visitor economy in destinations struggling to maintain livability. 

Here are three key takeaways from the workshop:
 

1. Start with Residents: Keep Livability as a North Star

A destination can't be great for visitors if it isn't great for the people who live there. Infrastructure for transport, energy, waste management, public spaces, digital connectivity  and environmental quality is a precondition for tourism. But when improvements benefit only tourists, they fuel resentment and erode community trust.

During our workshop, we saw how Japan's cities model "dual use." In Sapporo, the same streets and plazas that host festivals also host everyday life, turning tourist improvements into quality-of-life gains for residents: safer sidewalks, better lighting, accessible transit, and cleaner parks.

This principle applies globally. A heritage trail in Mombasa can become a daily commute route. Rehabilitated pavements and streets in Gjirokastra make life easier for residents and open new opportunities for businesses and tourists. Every tourism intervention should enhance the livability of local communities.

2. Spread Benefits Across Places, Firms, and People

Tourism often concentrates by location and season, risking overcrowding in hotspots and limiting who benefits. 

To become more resilient, gains must be spread out. Kyoto's "decentralization" strategy guides travelers beyond famous sites to lesser-known neighborhoods, protecting heritage while boosting local economies. Turning secondary cities into attractive destinations can also reduce pressure on hotspots and bring income to underserved communities. This along with well-managed seasonality—which can offer a break for places to recover—can build resilience. 

Economically, tourism is driven in part by small and medium sized businesses which often face barriers to finance and markets. Destinations need to enable access to targeted support to address these constraints and help businesses to become more resilient, like targeted financial instruments, business development services, and stronger market linkages.

Skills also matter. During the workshop, we heard how hospitality training in Pakistan is equipping young people for better jobs. Investing in human capital—language skills, service excellence, entrepreneurship, and management—multiplies the returns on physical investment and helps workers weather economic shocks.

3. Equip Institutions with Feedback Loops 

Resilient tourism needs governance that measures, listens, and adjusts.

In some cases, these feedback loops are mechanisms for citizen engagement and sentiment measurement, such as Barcelona’s resident perception surveys. Other destinations like Kyoto have developed digital management systems to collect real-time data to better respond to the needs of residents and tourists alike. 

When institutions learn, destinations avoid becoming extractive. They can protect the assets that make them unique, steward the environment, and maintain trust. That is the foundation for long-term competitiveness.

Building Resilience, Choice by Choice

On Global Tourism Resilience Day, February 17, we celebrate a sector that has shown remarkable strength. But resilience isn't automatic: it's built choice by choice, project by project.

Like that public square in Sapporo—serving residents one month and welcoming the world the next—resilient tourism destinations work for everyone. When we design for residents first, spread benefits broadly, and build institutions that learn, tourism becomes more than a survivor of shocks. It becomes a driver of shared prosperity for generations to come.