WTTC brings Maribel Rodríguez back to the top of the organisation: destinations become the centre of the new tourism strategy
The World Travel & Tourism Council, one of the most influential bodies of the private tourism sector in the world, has appointed Maribel Rodríguez as Executive Vice President for Destinations. This marks the return of an experienced manager to the organisation at a time when global tourism is once again recording strong growth, but is simultaneously entering a period of increased pressure on infrastructure, local communities, the environment and governance models. In practice, this staffing decision is not merely a personnel change at the top of WTTC, but also a message about where the organisation wants to direct the next phase of tourism development: toward destinations that can no longer be just a stage for tourist traffic, but active managers of growth, quality of life and investment priorities.
According to publicly available information published on 09 April 2026, Rodríguez is returning to WTTC with the new task of connecting governments, local tourism organisations, investors and the private sector around the shared management of destinations. This is an important signal also because of the broader context in which WTTC has in recent months been building a new governance structure under the leadership of Gloria Guevara, who was reappointed President and Chief Executive Officer of the organisation. In the tourism industry, such a shift is interpreted as an attempt to strengthen WTTC’s political and operational weight in discussions on sustainability, investment, international connectivity and the sector’s resilience to geopolitical and economic shocks.
Return to WTTC at a time when tourism is growing, but also becoming more sensitive
The announcement of Maribel Rodríguez’s appointment itself comes at a time when international tourism, according to UN Tourism estimates, returned to record levels in 2025 and reached around 1.52 billion international arrivals. At first glance, such data confirm that the global recovery after pandemic disruptions has been completed. But behind the figures lies a more complex reality: traffic growth does not automatically mean destination stability, and an increased number of guests does not necessarily guarantee greater sustainability, a better distribution of revenue or less pressure on the everyday lives of residents in the most visited cities and regions.
That is precisely why WTTC has for some time been warning that the issue of destination management has become one of the key development questions for the entire sector. In its analysis from last year on pressure on popular tourist locations, the organisation stressed that the problem of so-called overtourism cannot be reduced only to the number of visitors. According to that logic, the real causes of pressure often lie in insufficient investment in public infrastructure, uncoordinated urban planning, weak institutional coordination and delayed decision-making. In other words, tourism success today is measured less and less exclusively by growth in arrivals, and increasingly by a destination’s ability to turn that growth into a long-term sustainable benefit.
In that context, the appointment of a person specifically responsible for destinations gains additional weight. According to available information, Rodríguez should lead efforts aimed at stronger cooperation between the public and private sectors, growth management, destination positioning and aligning tourism policies with the needs of local communities. This means that the focus will be not only on promoting travel, but also on issues such as city capacity, transport connectivity, product development, attracting quality investment and preserving the social acceptability of tourism.
Who is Maribel Rodríguez and why is her return important
Maribel Rodríguez is not a new name in international tourism, and even less so in WTTC. She built her career in the aviation and hotel sectors, working in companies such as Ryanair, British Airways, Virgin Express and Travelodge, and first joined WTTC in 2014. During the previous decade in the organisation, she held a number of senior roles, including positions related to membership, commercial operations, events and international development, and took part in expanding the organisation’s global reach and preparing its most important summits.
After leaving WTTC in 2024, she remained present in the international tourism space as an adviser and through initiatives focused on leadership development in the sector. Public biographical information also shows that she is linked to the organisation Women Leading Tourism, that she has an education in psychology and business management, and that she has profiled herself as a person who knows both the corporate and institutional sides of tourism well. This is important for WTTC because destination policy today requires exactly such a profile: someone who understands the market, investment, reputation management, but also relations with public authorities.
Additional weight is given to her appointment by the fact that she had already previously been involved in projects that helped WTTC expand its geographical influence and organise major international gatherings. When such experience is combined with a new role focused on destinations, WTTC is clearly counting on a person who can speak with ministers, mayors, national tourism organisations and leading private companies in the same language of interests, figures and strategic goals.
Gloria Guevara is assembling new leadership and expanding WTTC’s ambition
The return of Maribel Rodríguez is difficult to separate from the broader reorganisation of WTTC after Gloria Guevara’s return to the head of the organisation. In January 2026, WTTC announced that Guevara had been reappointed President and Chief Executive Officer, with the message that the organisation wants to strengthen its global influence, deepen its work with membership and act more strongly in the field of investment, jobs and international advocacy for the sector’s interests. WTTC defines itself as the global voice of the private sector in tourism, with members from aviation, hospitality, cruising, travel technologies and other related industries.
In such an architecture, the new Executive Vice President for Destinations is not merely an administrative function. She is a signal that WTTC wants to connect more strongly the discussion on the economic impact of tourism with concrete spatial management and local development. This is especially important because the industry is facing double pressure. On the one hand, it is expected to continue generating growth, jobs and export value. On the other hand, there is an increasingly strong demand that this growth should not deepen housing, transport and environmental problems in the most attractive destinations.
At the end of 2025, WTTC additionally showed that it wants to strengthen its operational position through the decision to relocate its global office to Madrid. The organisation then announced that its new office in the Spanish capital would enable deeper contact with members, better access to global talent and more effective advocacy for the sector’s interests. When this decision is combined with the new appointment at the top of the organisation, it is clear that WTTC wants to strengthen the European and Mediterranean axis, but also reinforce its presence in conversations concerning investment, planning and destination management.
Why destinations are now at the centre of tourism policy
In the last few years, the word “destination” in the tourism sector is no longer used only as a marketing term. It is increasingly used to describe a complex system in which the interests of residents, local politics, investors, air carriers, hotel chains, small-scale renters, cultural institutions and municipal infrastructure intersect. When WTTC now specifically singles out destinations as an area for a new executive function, it is in fact acknowledging that it is precisely at that level that both the greatest opportunities and the greatest conflicts of modern tourism arise.
According to published information, Rodríguez emphasised that destinations are today more than ever at the centre of tourism transformation and that the future of the sector depends on stronger public-private cooperation, responsible growth management and placing local communities at the centre of tourism strategies. This wording clearly shows how the language of the industry is changing. The former emphasis on promotion and increasing traffic is now being supplemented by concepts such as responsible growth, social acceptability, resilience and coordinated management.
This is no coincidence. Cities and regions around the world increasingly want more tourist spending, but less pressure on housing, public transport and utility systems at the same time. Local authorities seek investment, but also greater control over the consequences of short-term rentals, seasonality and the overburdening of historic centres. The private sector seeks predictability of rules, while residents seek quality of life. That is exactly why a function that connects destination management with global advocacy is becoming strategically important.
From growth towards managing growth
The most important change that can be read from this appointment is a shift in focus from mere growth to growth management. WTTC continues to emphasise the enormous economic importance of tourism. The organisation has previously stated that the sector supports almost a tenth of global GDP and a significant share of employment, and in its more recent estimates for 2025 it speaks of record economic achievements in global tourism. However, alongside such figures there is an increasingly present message that more traffic without smart planning can create long-term problems that are later harder and more expensive to correct.
This is especially visible in Europe, where some destinations are simultaneously exceptionally successful and extremely burdened. In its own analyses, WTTC warned that the issue of overcrowding should not be trivialised or turned into a conflict of “residents versus tourists”. Instead, the organisation advocates practical measures: better spatial and transport distribution of visitors, investment in infrastructure, stronger involvement of local authorities, higher-quality data for decision-making and long-term planning that does not react only when the problem grows into a political crisis.
From that perspective, Rodríguez enters the new role as a person who should help turn general messages about sustainability into a more operational approach. Whether this will mean new standards, partnerships, advisory formats or politically more influential initiatives is not yet fully clarified. But the available information indicates that the emphasis will be on connecting destination organisations and the private sector around shared responses to the growing complexity of the tourism market.
The industry seeks stability, while destinations increasingly seek balance
The travel and tourism sector enters 2026 with good traffic indicators, but also with a series of external risks. Geopolitical tensions, inflationary pressures, demand sensitivity, climate challenges and accelerated digital transformation are changing the way tourists travel and the way destinations plan capacity. In such an environment, it is no longer enough to have a strong brand or a good promotional budget. What is needed is the ability to adapt quickly, manage reputation and make decisions based on data.
WTTC itself has in recent months been sending messages that it wants to place destinations in the foreground. At the beginning of 2026, it was announced that as many as 15 destinations from four continents are competing to host future WTTC global summits, while Malta was confirmed as host of the 2026 summit in Valletta. This shows that the organisation is increasingly relying on cities and states that want to be more than tourist scenery: they want to present themselves as places of innovation, sustainability, investment openness and political relevance within the global tourism conversation.
For WTTC, this means that it must offer more than general messages about sector growth. It must be a platform that can help destinations deal with very concrete questions: how to distribute tourism flows, how to preserve social support for tourism, how to attract investment that does not undermine the identity of a place, and how to use technology without further deepening inequalities between large and small markets. That is exactly why this staffing decision goes beyond biographical interest and becomes an indicator of a new phase within the organisation itself.
What the appointment could mean for the coming period
Although the real effects of the appointment will become visible only through WTTC’s moves in the months ahead, it can already be concluded that the organisation wants to intervene more strongly in the discussion about how tourism is managed, and not only how much it grows. In that sense, the return of Maribel Rodríguez can be read as an attempt to bring back to the top of the organisation a person with experience in international summits, corporate relations and destination strategy, precisely at a time when the sector is seeking more precise answers to questions of sustainability and social balance.
For global tourism, the message is also clear. The era in which success could be measured almost exclusively by the number of arrivals is increasingly giving way to a period in which the key competitive advantage will be the ability to manage space, quality of experience and the relationship with the local community. With this appointment, WTTC shows that it has recognised this shift and that it no longer sees destinations as the final point of travel, but as the central place where the future of the entire sector will be decided.
Sources:- - WTTC – official announcement on the reappointment of Gloria Guevara as President and Chief Executive Officer link
- - WTTC – official announcement on the relocation of WTTC’s global office to Madrid link
- - WTTC – official announcement on the interest of 15 destinations in hosting future global summits and the confirmation of Malta for 2026 link
- - WTTC – official announcement and analysis on the need for smarter management of tourism pressures on destinations link
- - UN Tourism – World Tourism Barometer with data on international tourist arrivals in 2025 link
- - eTurboNews – report on the appointment of Maribel Rodríguez as WTTC Executive Vice President for Destinations link
- - Women Leading Tourism – publicly available biographical page of Maribel Rodríguez link
- - Hosteltur – earlier report on Maribel Rodríguez’s departure from WTTC in 2024 and her role in the organisation up to that point link
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