Travel and tourism is one of the world’s fastest growing industries and the United States wants a bigger piece of the pie. That’s why The Travel Promotion Act was signed into law in early 2010. It created the Corporation for Travel Promotion to promote foreign leisure, business and scholarly travel and maximize the economic and social benefits of that travel for communities across the country.

The corporation’s first chief executive officer, Jim Evans, is a longtime leader in the hospitality industry and former president and chief executive officer of Best Western International. "Attracting more international travelers to the U.S. will benefit the industry and our country by creating jobs, growing exports and spurring economic growth," says Evans.

The numbers explain why this is so important. Over the next 10 years, travel and tourism's total contribution to global GDP is forecast to rise to $9.2 trillion, bringing with it 65 million new jobs. By 2021, travel and tourism will be responsible for one in 10 jobs, according to the World Travel and Tourism Council. Within the United States, travel and tourism is currently the nation's largest services sector export, representing 25% of service exports and 7% of all U.S. exports.

Evans recently talked to Lodging Hospitality about the corporation and its efforts to capture some of these dollars.

Why was the agency formed?
We’re one of the few nations in the world that doesn’t have unified national [tourism] marketing. Here we are as a leader of the world and we haven’t kept pace with our key competitors in the travel industry. For years, we seemed to dominate international tourism, but post-9/11 we lost a significant amount of our share of that business. We lost the opportunity to make friends with a lot of people around the world. We lost a lot of jobs in the travel and tourism sector.

If we can improve the inbound traffic the way we feel we can, the impact on our nation and our economy expands exponentially. I really believe this is an opportunity to grow our nation’s success.

How will the corporation address that?
Our efforts are at the beginning stages. Our key is to get everyone involved with the idea of marketing and identifying what this brand stands for. That brand is the United States. We need to create a message across the nation.

How will you spend the $200-million budget?
We’re going to spend the vast majority of our dollars on international marketing. We need to brand our entire nation, not just our primary destinations. There isn’t a nation in the world with as much diversity to offer as we do. The more people see, the better our nation’s image is. We’ll focus beyond iconic destinations, including secondary and tertiary destinations, like our national parks.

What’s first on the agenda?
We’re putting our infrastructure in place, establishing an organizational chart, all the things every startup goes through Our highest priority is finding a chief marketing officer. We’re beginning interviews. The key for us is the urgency of getting the foundation put in place with a clear focus on developing our marketing team.

What can hotel operators expect to see?
Folks in the hospitality industry will see dynamic branding of the U.S. as the best destination in the world. They’ll see tourism being elevated as one of the most important industries in our nation.