It´s official! Thank you so much GIZ and SWG RRD teams, SEDRA I project colleagues and translators, with the Global Sustainable Tourism Council, for getting this DONE! Now we can really start working with this serious set of globally relevant standards & tools.
#LoveYourNeighbour & #BuildBackBetter with #Sustainable #Tourism
Find the GSTC Criteria translations, here.
This is how it went:
- In June 2019, in Pogradec, Albania, we had a work meeting with the first introduction to help connect rural tourism policies and the GSTC sustainability standards. Thank you, Dr. Ioannis Pappas for joining us! Here a post of 20th June 2019 with impressions.
- November 2019: At the 13th Annual Working Meeting of the Ministers of Agriculture from South-Eastern Europe (SEE) in Pristina, the Ohrid Agenda was written and presented, including the outcome which links the EU policies with sustainable rural development and tourism:
“As EU policies are supporting diversified economic approaches, rural tourism becomes one of the new sources of sustainable development and income generation in the rural communities. While rural tourism constitutes a growing source of revenue for the Western Balkan countries/territories, much of that growth has been restricted by poor infrastructure, education and promotion activities, often with adverse environmental effects. To support economic diversification, the tourism sector requires efficient educational and management systems and improved coordination of rural tourism value chains. Furthermore, to bring together rural development and tourism policies the GSTC Criteria are available.” - In December 2019, at the GSTC 2019 Global Conference on Terceira Island, Azores, Portugal, GSTC CEO Randy Durband announced the good news in front of 250 participants from 42 countries. “The GSTC Criteria play an important role in sustainable travel and tourism throughout the world,” said Randy Durband, GSTC CEO. “Because it is important that the technical language of sustainability be well understood by travel and tourism professionals, we are very glad the GSTC Criteria were translated by the Regional Rural Development Standing Working Group, and GIZ in the project SEDRA.”
- May 2020: As the first destination from Montenegro to make the move, Tivat has chosen to improve in all aspects of sustainability – in cooperation with the GSTC-Accredited Certification Body Green Destinations. The National Tourism Organisation is planning to present the program to all local tourism organisations in the country as soon as personal work meetings are possible.
