Sustainable Business Travel Transition Pathway  

Business travel is a $1.48 trillion industry, playing a critical role in the global economy. However, it also contributes significantly to greenhouse gas emissions, making it a key focus area for corporate sustainability efforts. As regulations change and companies commit to emissions reduction goals, integrating sustainability into business travel is no longer optional – it’s a necessity.

This transition pathway, developed by the GBTA Foundation in collaboration with Accenture, aims to support efforts by organizations of all sizes and in all geographies, to start, advance, and accelerate their sustainable travel practices. It will also directly help companies participating in the GBTA Sustainability Acceleration Challenge, to improve their travel program’s maturity levels and sustainability score with a 2030 horizon.

For each of the four categories of action and fifteen practices outlined in the toolbox (section 1), the pathway details iterative steps organizations can take to advance from wherever they stand in their journey to ‘leading practice’ (section 2). Organizations can understand how their progress is being measured by reviewing the scoring methodology developed by Accenture (section 3). They can also benchmark themselves based on the current state of the industry (section 4). Finally, next steps highlight how to get leaders invested despite the variety of headwinds facing travel sustainability in 2025 (section 5).