A new EU funded project kicks off today in Leeds supporting the European Charter for Protected Areas to roll out sustainability criteria for tourism suppliers within national parks. Representatives from several European national parks, the Europarc Federation, and the Univesities of Joensuu and LeedsMet are having their first team meeting in our sunny Headingley campus.

ICRT’s role is to transfer expertise in sustainable tourism certification and to conduct an European wide survey on the competitive advantage gained by small businesses from operating and marketing sustainably, over the next 18 months. (more…)

ICRT will be working with Travel Operators for Tigers to prepare a fundraising plan to raise the sustainability practices of tour operators and their suppliers working in tiger tourism in India.  This project allows the participation of an European person holding a Leonardo scholarship and looking for a host institution, with conservation/development/  forestry/ tourism/ business backgrounds.

A recent article from The Times reporting plans to stop tiger tourism in India blamed tourism for the increasing pressure put on the ecosystem that tigers rely on. While the Indian government has since confirmed they have no intention to stop tiger tourism, it has fuelled a new round of questions about the sustainability of managing tiger reserves, showing once more the conflict in objectives between conservationists, tourism companies and the local population.

Travel Operators for Tigers has been working for years with their supply chains to introduce sustainability standards to both raise awareness and change behaviour. TOFT is a unique project and to date has been self funded. The next phase of TOFT has to be moving from a small scale demonstration project to achieving the critical mass to demonstrate there is another way to manage tiger tourism.

If you are interested in taking part in preparing a business plan for TOFT’s growth, with fundraising at the centre of it,  speak with Xavier at x.font@leedsmet.ac.uk

After recent visits to Indonesia building on several years spent living and working there, Dr. Janet Cochrane is delighted to have won funding from the British Council to develop a joint Masters programme with an Indonesian university. The grant is to develop a collaboration between Leeds Met and the Bandung Institute of Tourism to train professionals in the planning and management skills needed for a successful tourism and hospitality industry. (more…)

ICRT’s Janet Cochrane has been instrumental in setting up the new ‘Ride Yorkshire’ association, which held its inaugural meeting at the end of April. By chance, Janet met the chairman of Visit York – John Yeomans – whilst trail-riding in the North York Moors, and they quickly realised they could use their personal and professional interests to encourage many more people to enjoy the superb Yorkshire landscapes from horseback. (more…)

We are now some six months into our contract to raise the profile of cycle tourism in Northumberland, England’s wildest and most northerly count. Our project officer, Anna Waddilove – an ICRT graduate – is doing an excellent job identifying new bike routes that link cycle-friendly accommodation providers, public transport links and the area’s many tourist attractions including forts that form part of Hadrian’s Wall World Heritage Site, castles, panels of Neolithic rock art and local food producers.  As part of the ‘Illuminating Hadrian’s Wall’ event that took place on 13th March, Anna organised a celebratory cycle tour that took participants through part of the WHS and that ended up at a cheese farm where everyone had a hearty meal whilst watching the beacons slowly come alight along the line of the wall. (more…)

ICRT staff Dr Xavier Font will form part of the challenging review of the customer experience that Whitbread branded cafes, restaurants and hotels offer of their CSR strategy Good Together. Whitbread is the UK’s leading hospitality company, with household brands Beefeater, Brewers Fayre, Costa Coffee, Table Table, Taybarn and Premier Inn.   

The aim of the review is to understand how Whitbread’s CSR strategy can be made more meaningful to the customer experience. The review is headed by PWC and will use site audits to develop innovative ways to improve CSR actions, better communicate current actions and improve customer engagement. The study takes place throughout February and March 2010.

Dr Xavier Font

En route from her research in the Mulu National Pa rk, Janet spent 3 days at a seminar in Miri, Sarawa k. The seminar was funded by the EU to encourage business links between European institutions and enterprises in East Asia .

Specifically, the companies present came from the ‘BIMP-EAGA’ region – the ‘Brunei-Indonesia-Malaysia-Philippines East Asia Growth Area’. One of the business strands was tourism, and Janet had over 25 one-to-one business meetings and made a presentation on ‘The Business Case for Responsible Tourism’ to an appreciative audience.

There was particular interest from South East Asian development agencies and Chambers of Commerce, especially those hoping to develop tourism in eastern areas of Indonesia – the parts tourists don’t usually get to! Having visited some of these places while exploring Indonesia in the 1980s and 1990s, Janet can confirm that there’s excellent tourism potential there for diving, hiking, cultural tourism and general tourism.

Amongst other things, it was encouraging to hear that the North Sulawesi tourism planners intend to manage their resources carefully, fostering responsible tourism through measures such as generating energy needs from geothermal sources.

Janet