Interview with Michele Zavoli
Travelware
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Michele Zavoli
CEO and founder of Travelware
Michele Zavoli is CEO and Co-Founder of Travelware SRL SB, an innovative startup and Benefit Corporation that is redefining the “operating system” of tourism destinations. His professional journey is rooted in more than 15 years of field experience with Humana Skala, where he directed projects in cooperation and sustainable tourism development in Africa, with a specific focus on Cape Verde and Mozambique.
During these years, he discovered a paradox: extraordinary transformation is possible with minimal resources—but only when communities become the architects of their own change. He organized five-thousand-person events uniting tourists and local residents around shared purpose. He mobilized local photographers and organizations to crowdsource promotional content. He transformed Sunday beach cleanups into celebrations—complete with DJs, music, and food—that collected tons of plastic waste while building community pride. He brought retired European doctors and their families to strengthen local health centers, turning medical missions into tourism experiences where visiting families vacationed while contributing their skills. Incrementally, he helped build an operational surgical center from this model of reciprocal exchange.
Yet he realized that these successes, however meaningful, could not scale through replication alone. Good practices remain isolated without the infrastructure to guide communities toward solving their own problems, uniting them under common objectives, and activating them as protagonists rather than beneficiaries. This insight—that communities need both vision and tools—led him to found Travelware, combining his deep knowledge of territorial dynamics with advanced Web3 and AI technologies to create scalable decentralized governance solutions that transform isolated initiatives into sustainable, community-led ecosystems.
In a tourism sector marked by fragmentation and coordination challenges, how would you define the main obstacle that Travelware seeks to solve, and how did your international experience help you identify the urgency of rethinking destination management through new collaborative and regenerative logics?
The primary obstacle is coordination failure at scale. Our data shows that beyond 50 stakeholders, traditional destination governance collapses: communication becomes chaotic and information becomes fragmented and unreliable.
My international experience with Humana Skala showed me that this is not merely a technical problem, but a systemic one. I witnessed destinations lose enormous opportunities because they were unable to align the interests of local operators, institutions, and residents. The urgency of adopting a regenerative logic stems from the observation that current models are extractive because they exclude the base of the pyramid from decision-making processes; we needed a tool to transform this fragmentation into collective intelligence.
You have worked in Africa and Europe, observing how tourism stakeholders operate in silos. Which lessons from those contexts were decisive for designing infrastructures capable of overcoming coordination failures and strengthening decentralized territorial governance processes based on collective intelligence?
Working in contexts like Cape Verde or rural areas of Mozambique, the decisive lesson was that technology must adapt to people, not the other way around. I learned that to break "silos" more than just management software is needed—an infrastructure that enables trust is essential. I observed that communities already possess vital information for their territories, but they lack channels to transmit it. Travelware was designed on this lesson: using AI to remove technical barriers and enable anyone, from the local artisan to the public official, to contribute with simple inputs (even voice messages) to a common strategy, creating a unified "Data Bridge".
Travelware presents itself as a Benefit Corporation that embraces Web3 technologies. What concrete advantages does decentralization offer—regarding transparency, decision-making and power redistribution—for transforming the way communities manage their own tourism ecosystems?
Travelware's decentralization through blockchain and the Travelhive DAO creates three concrete advantages.
First, transparency: Every transaction and fund allocation is immutably recorded and visible to all stakeholders, eliminating the opacity that allows tourism profits to leak away from communities.
Second, distributed decision-making: NFT Memberships and Soulbound Tokens enable verified community members to propose and vote on initiatives based on merit, not capital alone, shifting power from distant corporate headquarters to lived local experience.
Third, structural power redistribution: Smart contracts automatically return 50% of tourism revenues to communities—not as corporate charity but as code-enforced rights. In our three pilot destinations—Boa Vista, Sal (Cape Verde), and Mossuril (Mozambique)—this model is already operational. When Travelware launches in 2026, communities will control their own development through the DAO, proposing and voting on new projects. This creates a virtuous cycle where every actor in the ecosystem—from local operators to institutional partners—becomes aligned with regenerative objectives, transforming what were once extractive supply chains into collaborative networks where profit and community well-being reinforce each other. Tourism becomes a regenerative ecosystem owned by those who live in it.
In your proposal you highlight the importance of communities reclaiming agency over their tourism resources. How does this translate into practical tools within the platform, and what changes do you expect once different stakeholders can collaborate without intermediaries or traditional hierarchical structures?
Community agency translates into two integrated tools: Travelhive, a DAO-based governance platform where communities propose initiatives and vote on priorities using voice-based AI interfaces in local languages; and Travelogue, a marketplace where unified communities negotiate directly with B2B and B2B2C partners (tour operators, agencies, platforms) from a position of collective strength. Rather than eliminating intermediaries, we empower fragmented local operators to speak as one voice, enabling them to demand transparent commissions and equitable profit-sharing instead of accepting the 25-30% extraction typical of traditional OTAs. Once communities collaborate through unified governance without hierarchical gatekeepers, three structural changes emerge: economic empowerment—communities in Boa Vista, Sal, and Mossuril already negotiate better terms and reinvest 50% in local projects and prizes for the community members; data sovereignty—communities control their narrative and tourism data rather than external platforms exploiting it; and strategic autonomy—the DAO allows communities to choose partners, target markets, and design their destination identity, transforming them from passive suppliers into active architects of their tourism future.
Many destinations pursue sustainability, but you speak of regeneration. What fundamental difference do you see between these two approaches, and how do the systems developed by Travelware allow tourism not only to minimize impacts, but actively to strengthen local social, economic and environmental fabrics?
Sustainability aims to "do no harm" (net-zero), maintaining the status quo. Regeneration aims to leave the place better than you found it (net-positive). Travelware makes this approach systemic through our business model: half of marketplace commissions (B2B and B2B2C) are automatically reinvested in community projects voted on by the DAO. We do not merely measure impact, but provide the continuous financial "fuel" to regenerate the social and economic fabric, transforming tourism into an active development engine for the host community.
According to 2025 trends, 66% of travelers want to leave destinations better than they found them. How can this motivation become a structural force within regenerative models based on data, distributed governance and ongoing community participation?
This motivation today encounters a lack of reliable channels. We make it structural by transforming the traveler into an active stakeholder. Through our platform, the traveler not only books but sees exactly how their money contributes to local projects (thanks to blockchain traceability). They can receive rewards (tokens/NFTs) for virtuous behaviors and participate in surveys about destination quality. In this way, the traveler's desire to "do good" is channeled into certain economic and informational flows that directly feed local governance.
One of the historic challenges in tourism management is the lack of shared information and the slowness of coordination. What innovations does Travelware introduce to enable real-time collaboration and more agile decisions among local entrepreneurs, public institutions and tourism operators?
The key innovation is "Cognitive Offloading" through AI. Often coordination is slow because analyzing data is complex. Our AI collects unstructured input (voice messages, texts, photos) from the community, verifies it, categorizes it, and maps it in real-time to decision dashboards (e.g., dynamic SWOT analyses). This enables institutions and entrepreneurs to see what is happening now, not months ago, and to make agile decisions based on "clean" data validated from the bottom up, overcoming traditional bureaucratic slowness.
Decentralized governance often raises doubts among organizations used to hierarchical models. What arguments do you use to demonstrate that distributed systems can improve efficiency, transparency and collective outcomes compared to traditional approaches to tourism planning?
Our system does not destroy hierarchies—it makes them transparent and interoperable. Through our flexible, fractal DAO architecture with next-generation account systems integrating identity verification for individuals and businesses (KYC/KYB compliance), blockchain wallets, and maintaining social network user friendly interfaces, we mirror existing governance structures and digitize them on-chain without dismantling them.
Multiple nested DAOs coexist within a destination (e.g., a Natural Park DAO under the Destination DAO), while national organizations like the Accademia Italiana della Cucina or environmental bodies operate their vertical hierarchies in the same system, issuing transparent, on-chain certifications. This unified architecture delivers unprecedented data precision: a restaurant certified by the Academy, recognized by environmental organizations, and voted by the community appears with verifiable, multi-source credibility in a single record—no silos, no duplication.
Citizens and micro-entrepreneurs can participate at multiple governance levels simultaneously, earning reputation-weighted voting power without overthrowing hierarchies. Efficiency improves dramatically: smart contracts automate routine approvals, stakeholders see real-time decision rationale, and bottlenecks dissolve. When organizations see their authority gain global visibility through on-chain verification while maintaining full legal power, skepticism transforms into adoption.
Your work emphasizes collective intelligence as a driver of transformation. How is this process structured within Travelware, and what mechanisms ensure that the voices of smaller stakeholders—local communities, micro-enterprises or citizen initiatives—carry real weight in decision-making?
In Travelware, collective intelligence is structured through certified Proposal, Vote, and Execution processes. To ensure weight for small stakeholders, we use meritocratic—not merely plutocratic—mechanisms: voting weight depends not only on capital but on the reputation earned by contributing valid data or quality services to the platform. Additionally, the voice-based interface removes entry barriers, allowing even those with limited digital literacy or scarce technological resources to submit proposals that, once validated by AI and the community, have the same formal dignity as those of major actors.
Technology can be an extraordinary enabler but also a risk when communities do not feel prepared. What strategies does Travelware implement to ensure inclusive technology adoption processes that minimize digital divides and sustainably strengthen local capacities?
Our inclusion strategy is based on the Social Network interface and Voice-Based bottom-up inputs. Working in Africa, I understood that digital literacy is the primary barrier. For this reason, Travelhive allows users to interact by speaking in their native language. AI serves as a mediator, translating and digitizing the input. Additionally, we provide field training programs (as we did in Humana Skala) together with local associations as "digital facilitators." Blockchain technology remains "under the hood"; the end user experiences a simple, human interface, minimizing the digital divide.
In destinations where mistrust exists among stakeholders, how does blockchain-based infrastructure help create verifiable systems that reduce conflicts, ensure traceability and foster greater commitment from those participating in the construction of joint regenerative projects?
Blockchain acts as an impartial "truth machine." In contexts of mistrust, the problem is often "who controls the controller?". With our permissioned (yet transparent) infrastructure, the rules are written in code. If we allocate funds for a regenerative project, everyone can verify that those funds were allocated and spent as promised. This mathematical certainty reduces conflicts based on suspicion and incentivizes commitment: stakeholders participate willingly when they know the system is fair and their contribution cannot be arbitrarily erased or ignored.
The concept of regenerative projects at scale implies coordination, reliable data and efficient governance mechanisms. Could you describe how Travelware articulates these three elements to transform isolated initiatives into collaborative systems capable of generating measurable long-term impacts?
Travelware articulates these three elements into an integrated virtuous cycle.
Reliable Data comes from communities inputting unstructured information (voice messages, photos, observations) through Travelhive's AI-powered interfaces in local languages; the Travelware Oracle verifies and structures this ground-truth data into unified maps of assets and opportunities.
Coordination flows from real-time dashboards and DAO-based decision-making where stakeholders align on priorities transparently and collectively, eliminating bureaucratic slowness.
Efficient Governance closes the loop: 50% of Travelogue marketplace revenues are automatically reinvested via smart contracts into community-voted regenerative projects (kindergartens, cultural preservation, social initiatives) tracked on blockchain. We have already proven this works in our African pilots: in Boa Vista, that money is supporting a kindergarten serving 30+ children, many whose parents work in tourism but had never seen direct benefits return to their community.
The measurable long-term impact emerges because each element reinforces the others, creating self-reinforcing resilience where communities continuously improve their capacity to manage their own development.
The shift towards more ethical and participatory tourism models is rapidly growing. What role do you think impact-driven startups like Travelware will play in the coming years, and how can they help redefine international standards of sustainability, innovation and community co-responsibility?
Startups like Travelware have the role of pioneers and bridge-builders. Large institutions are slow to change; we can quickly demonstrate that a model in which profit is subordinated to community well-being is not only ethical but economically superior. We redefine standards by introducing "Community Return on Investment" metrics alongside financial ROI. Operating as a "Data Bridge" between local communities and travel giants (OTAs), we impose a standard of data quality and truth that will force the entire sector toward greater responsibility and authenticity.
Finally, how do you imagine the future of destinations that fully embrace regeneration and decentralized governance models? What cultural, economic and social changes do you expect to see when collaboration flows without friction and the community truly becomes the heart of tourism planning?
I imagine destinations that are "alive," where residents do not endure tourism but design it.
Culturally: I see a renaissance of identity pride, because the narrative of the territory is in the hands of those who live it.
Economically: I see widespread prosperity, where wealth is not extracted but circulates locally, creating resilience against global crises.
Socially: I see more cohesive communities, where collaboration has replaced fragmentation and inside competition.
A New Model of Global Connection: Tourism will evolve from a transactional industry into a bridge between two kinds of communities: the communities rooted in territories—who steward the land, culture, and heritage—and passion-based international communities united by shared interests, values, and aspirations.
A traveler passionate about marine conservation will connect not just with a destination's beaches, but with local guardians of coastal ecosystems and a global network of ocean advocates. A culinary enthusiast will engage with artisan food producers, traditional knowledge-keepers, and international chefs pursuing the same vision of authentic, regenerative food systems. These connections are verified and deepened through our platform, creating meaningful exchanges that transcend typical tourism transactions.
When the community becomes the heart of planning, tourism ceases to be a consumption industry and becomes a tool for cultural diplomacy and human development—a living dialogue between those who belong to a place and those who choose to care for it. This is the future we are building, starting from Europe and Africa.
The authors are responsible for the choice and presentation of the facts contained in this document and for the opinions expressed therein, which are not necessarily those of Tourism and Society Think Tank and do not commit the Organization, and should not be attributed to TSTT or its members.
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