The symposium’s primary participants will be executives involved in ‘green’ innovations in coastal resort and second home design, construction, financing and property management, as well as marine tourism. Gathered for the first time in Mexico, the executives at this symposium are the ‘thought-leaders’ and pioneers who are breaking the mold of the old approach to building hotels and vacation homes, and forging new, sustainable techniques that are the wave of the future.  Participants will also include officials from government agencies (including FONATUR and SECTUR), development organizations, NGO experts, and Stanford faculty. The Symposium will have a geographic focus on coastal areas in the Americas, with a strong emphasis on Mexico.  

The symposium will serve as a platform for those on the cutting edge of new coastal tourism models to share what they have accomplished and what they have learned along the way.  Designing and operating in an era of global climate change will be discussed, as will access to ‘green’ financing and progressive investors.  The symposium will explore ways to overcome the barriers that have until-now prevented sustainable design from going mainstream.  Key to this discussion will be access to capital, and reluctance by traditional financiers to move away from the cookie-cutter approach that has little regard to environmental or social footprints.

Why Los Cabos?

 A significant contingent of participants at the 1st Innovators Symposium at Stanford were either from, or working in Mexico, and there was a consensus that the next symposium would be best held ‘south of the border’.  Los Cabos is both an important biological zone and currently Mexico’s most popular tourism destination, giving our upcoming Innovators Symposium an opportunity to showcase sustainable alternatives to conventional mass tourism. We have selected the Sheraton Hacienda del Mar in Los Cabos which is implementing a number of responsible management practices and actively supporting community purchases and projects.

Click Here to read a press release about Hacienda del Mar's Green Meetings initiative & their community project: Casa Hogar.

The rapid pace of resort and vacation home developments, particularly along coastlines and on islands within a day’s reach of the North American market, is contributing to a variety of environmental problems.  The problems range from destruction of mangroves, coral reefs, coastal forests, and native biota, to shortages of water, energy, and local foods such as fish and lobster. Economically, ownership and use of coastlines is shifting from nationals to foreigners. Much of this coastal tourism development is more about real estate speculation than long term investment. Many investors strive to get in and out of projects within a few years and make decisions designed to maximize quick profits. For instance, the growth of golf courses is not based solely on market demand for these activities. In Costa Rica, only 3% of international tourists play golf, yet most resort developments include a golf course as part of their plans, because golf courses increase the value of both the resort and vacation homes located near by. The fact that foreign ownership increasingly dominates coastal regions, that ownership frequently changes hands and involves multiple layers of investors and managers, and that vacationers and home buyers are only on site for brief periods, makes for a highly unstable situation, with little commitment to the long-term well being of the region. It can be said that there are many owners of coastal resort development, but few who take ownership.