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The Hague, 21 September 2026 — UN International Day of Peace
A new international tourism alliance seeking to connect travel with peace, climate action and education for the next generation has been launched virtually from The Hague, with an ambitious goal: to turn a worldwide network of Peace Parks into living spaces for environmental learning, international friendship and responsible travel.
CanadaStrong.travelbrings together SUNx Malta and its sister foundation, the SUNx BestStar Global Institute (SxBGI), with the International Institute for Peace through Tourism (IIPT), Global Himalayan Expeditions (GHE), travel technology company Tripian and the World Tourism Network (WTN).
At the heart of the initiative is a plan to introduce SUNx Malta’s Dodo4Kids climate education programmeand the principles of the Earth Charterinto IIPT Peace Parks around the world by 2030, beginning with the historic network of 350 Peace Parks established across Canada.
The choice of Canada — and of the name CanadaStrong.travel — carries particular significance. The initiative draws inspiration from Maurice Strong, the Canadian environmental pioneer who played a formative role in the development of the modern international environmental movement.
Strong served as Secretary-General of the landmark 1972 United Nations Conference on the Human Environment in Stockholm and became the first Executive Director of the UN Environment Programme. Two decades later, he served as Secretary-General of the 1992 UN Conference on Environment and Development — the Rio Earth Summit — which helped establish much of the framework for contemporary international action on climate change, biodiversity and sustainable development.
SUNx Malta describes its Climate Friendly Travel program as a continuation of Strong’s legacy, promoting tourism that is lower-carbon, linked to the UN Sustainable Development Goals and supportive of the Paris climate goals and nature.
From Canada’s Peace Parks to a global network
CanadaStrong.travel also reconnects with an unusual chapter in Canadian tourism and peace-building history.
In 1992, as Canada celebrated its 125th anniversary, IIPT conceived and implemented Peace Parks Across Canada. Some 350 cities and towns, stretching from St. John’s in Newfoundland to Victoria in British Columbia, dedicated parks to peace.
The dedications took place on 8 October 1992, coinciding with the unveiling of Canada’s National Peacekeeping Monument in Ottawa. The parks incorporated a Bosco Sacro , or Peace Grove, originally consisting of 12 trees representing Canada’s then 10 provinces and two territories and symbolising both a connection with nature and hope for the future.
That Canadian initiative subsequently became the foundation for IIPT’s wider Global Peace Parks programme, with Peace Parks established internationally, including at Bethany Beyond the Jordan, Victoria Falls and other locations associated with IIPT conferences and summits.
CanadaStrong.travel now intends to build on that legacy by giving the parks an expanded educational and environmental role.
Ajay Prakash, President of IIPT, said the alliance intends to revitalise Canada’s 350 Peace Parks and make them practical demonstrations of what “peace through tourism” can mean at community level.
“We shall revitalise the 350 Peace Parks in Canada and make these spaces living examples of what peace through tourism can mean in communities around the world,” Prakash said. “The introduction of Dodo4Kids at these parks will help in reaching out to the younger generation — the leaders of tomorrow.”
Putting children at the centre
A defining feature of the alliance is its focus on young people.
SUNx Malta developed Dodo4Kidsas part of its Education2Action programme to introduce school-age children to climate change, biodiversity, sustainability and more responsible forms of travel through stories, cartoons, games and other learning materials.
Its unlikely ambassador is the dodo — the famously extinct bird of Mauritius — reimagined as a character travelling to tourism destinations and helping children understand the environmental pressures those places face.
The Peace Parks initiative is not starting from scratch. In March 2026, SUNx Malta announced with IIPT and the World Tourism Network that Dodo4Kids would be made available electronically through the international Peace Parks network. CanadaStrong.travel is intended to broaden that collaboration by connecting climate education, Peace Parks, community experiences and purpose-driven travel.
Professor Geoffrey Lipman, co-founder and President of SUNx Malta, said the alliance was deliberately being launched against a backdrop of climate pressures and international tensions.
“In today’s troubled, sometimes hostile world, we are taking a stand for Climate Friendly Travel and international friendship. We are doing it with a laser-like focus on supporting nature and tomorrow’s generations for a brighter future.”
The Earth Charter connection
The alliance’s emphasis on Maurice Strong also creates a direct link with the Earth Charter, which CanadaStrong.travel plans to incorporate alongside Dodo4Kids.
The connection is substantial. In 1994, Strong and former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev launched the initiative that eventually produced the Earth Charter, following an earlier call by the Brundtland Commission for a new set of principles to guide sustainable development.
After an extensive international consultation and drafting process, the final Earth Charter was formally launched in June 2000 at the Peace Palace in The Hague — giving the CanadaStrong.travel launch from The Hague more than a symbolic geographical connection to its environmental roots.
The Charter is organised around four broad pillars: respect and care for the community of life; ecological integrity; social and economic justice; and democracy, nonviolence and peace. It presents sustainability not simply as an environmental question but as one involving relationships between people, societies and the natural world.
That combination closely mirrors CanadaStrong.travel’s proposed focus on peace, people and planet.
Tourism as a bridge between people
The initiative also revives a proposition IIPT has championed for four decades: that tourism can have a purpose beyond visitor numbers and economic returns.
IIPT traces its history to 1986 and has promoted the concept of tourism as a potential contributor to intercultural understanding and peace. Its work has included Peace Parks, sustainable tourism initiatives and international conferences focused on what it calls “peace through tourism.”
CanadaStrong.travel attempts to combine that philosophy with the increasingly urgent challenge of making tourism more resilient and environmentally responsible.
Other alliance partners add practical dimensions to that ambition. Global Himalayan Expeditionshas pioneered an impact-tourism model in which expeditions have helped bring solar power and other infrastructure to remote Himalayan communities. The UNFCCC has highlighted its use of tourism and technology to finance community-owned solar microgrids in remote regions.
The World Tourism Network, meanwhile, describes its role as providing a global platform particularly for small and medium-sized tourism businesses and connecting private- and public-sector stakeholders around more inclusive and sustainable tourism development.
WTN Chairman Juergen Steinmetz said:
“At WTN, we stand with CanadaStrong.travel and the vision of tourism-led friendship between people that it embodies.”
Why The Hague matters
The virtual launch from The Hague Humanity Hubadds another layer to the initiative’s peace and sustainability narrative.
The Hub is an independent non-profit organisation that brings together organisations and professionals working in peace, justice and humanitarian action. It describes its purpose as strengthening an ecosystem working toward “a more peaceful and just world” through collaboration, knowledge exchange and innovation.
The Hague is also where the Earth Charter was formally launched at the Peace Palace in 2000, with Maurice Strong serving as one of the Charter Commission’s co-chairs.
Twenty-six years later, CanadaStrong.travel is drawing those threads together: Strong’s Canadian environmental legacy, the Earth Charter, IIPT’s Peace Parks, climate education and a tourism industry searching for ways to demonstrate a positive contribution to destinations and communities.
The alliance’s larger challenge will be turning those principles into programmes that work locally — in parks, schools, tourism businesses and communities.
Its target is 2030.
If successful, the project would transform an initiative that began with trees planted for peace in Canadian communities more than three decades ago into a wider international platform where children, travelers and local communities encounter the linked ideas of peace, environmental stewardship and responsible travel.
For CanadaStrong.travel, that is also the underlying proposition behind its launch on the UN International Day of Peace: that travel can be more than movement between places. It can also be an opportunity to strengthen understanding between people — while encouraging greater responsibility for the planet they share.
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