• Support funding research on benefits of certification.
NGOs can lobby together with the STSC to funding agencies to support developing field research on the impact that certification can have on key areas of the tourism industry especially for those that are more vulnerable to change, such as small firms and community projects, especially in Southern hemisphere countries. As previously outlined for governments, NGOs can partner to fund research on the benefits of certification with the purpose of identifying which sectors of the tourism industry can benefit from certification and identifying constraints to certification and how these can be overcome.
• Tourist information dissemination.
STSC will provide a tool for tourists to practice pro-sustainability principles and to lessen or improve poor environmental and socio-cultural practices. NGOs and consumer associations can help educate consumers by disseminating information about sustainable tourism development and specifically about tourism certification programs that provide a guarantee that their holidays have a lower impact.
• Incorporate social and environmental concerns.
NGOs will be included on the STSC Advisory Board to ensure that a wide range of sustainability issues are considered and reviewed. Social concerns have not featured high in the list of current certification criteria and standards and NGOs have a role to lobby for inclusion of socio-cultural and pro-destination issues alongside the more mainstream environmental criteria.
Intergovernmental institutions
• Provide credibility and endorsement.
The STSC-Network needs to secure endorsement at a level that leverages support amongst other stakeholders. Intergovernmental institutions can provide credibility and legitimacy to the STSC. UNEP and WTO will be invited to sit on the STSC Advisory Board and other intergovernmental institutions will be invited to be members of the STSC-Network. Also intergovernmental institutions can be channels to disseminate the proposals for international standards and accreditation criteria among stakeholders that STSC would otherwise not be able to reach.
• Fund academic research on benefits of certification.
Intergovernmental institutions can fund academic research on the benefits of tourism certification as a tool to implement international commitments to sustainability and ethics.
Donors and financial institutions
• Financial support for network coordination and meetings and workshops.
The Rainforest Alliance has started to fundraise amongst donors for financial support for the network coordination and activities. The STSC-Network activity level will be directly dependent upon the success in fundraising.
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• Provide funding to other stakeholders for research and participation.
The budget included in this report covers the costs of managing the network, but does not include conference and travel funds for key stakeholders that may need financial assistance, or other key research. Donors will be approached to fund the participation of small tourism firms and NGOs in regional workshops to determine the operation of the STSC, international standards and accreditation criteria.
• Continue to fund pilot certification programs, especially in areas of high biodiversity value and with socio/cultural concerns.
A number of tourism certification programs receive support of donor agencies either directly or through NGOs, generally in Southern hemisphere countries and in areas of high biodiversity value or where tourism has caused considerable socio-cultural impacts. STSC will recommend donor agencies to continue funding pilot certification programs.
Accreditation organizations
! Encouraged to participate and share knowledge.
The STSC will aim to ensure that processes and procedures of accreditation meet international standards set amongst recognized accreditation associations. To this effect, the STSC-Network will invite ISEAL, IAF and specific accreditation bodies from other industries to share their experience with STSC regarding the feasibility of the proposals in this report and how these are rolled out during the network phase.
Tourists
• Market research on consumer behavior and willingness to pay in key markets.
In order to develop a consumer-driven message, the STSC-Network should consider conducting or collaborating on some market research on consumer behavior and willingness to pay in key markets. This task was not undertaken for this report due to budgetary limitations and also because the concept of a STSC was not developed enough to test it. The initial research shows that tourists are willing to pay for overall quality. The STSC should closely monitor the experience of VISIT’s marketing message, test the positioning benefits and devise medium term communication campaigns for key outbound tourism markets.
6.1.4. Finance
This section reviews estimated expenses and revenues for the STSC-Network based on the research conducted for this study. The primary assumptions are:
• That the STSC-Network will be in effect for two years during which time the STSC standards will be developed. Additional time to disseminate them might be needed during STSC-Association stage.
• The STSC-Network will tap into existing regional networks in Europe and Asia/Pacific. In terms of costs, they should be fairly minimal to liaise with existing networks (travel, communications).
• The STSC-Network will develop additional regional networks in Latin America and Africa. Ideally, there will be sufficient funding to develop networks in both regions.
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These costs are reflected in the full network budget (Budget B). Realistically, there may be only funding for one regional network in Latin America.
Costs
The cost of establishing and maintaining the international network and regional initiatives will vary depending upon the number of regions represented and the level of activity. To be successful, the international coordinator and regional representatives should be paid; otherwise there is a danger that there will not be any consistent forward movement.
Costs may vary from an annual budget of $265,000 (Budget A) to cover 2.5 staff (full-time coordinator, part-time assistant, and one regional representative in Latin America), the cost of maintaining the electronic network and other forms of communication, and meetings and travel (one annual conference, a workshop in Latin America, and costs to liaise with European, Asian-Pacific, and North American networks) to $380,000 (Budget B) to cover all costs in Budget A plus an additional representative in Africa, a workshop in Africa, and overhead costs associated with the additional region.
This information is summarized below in two budgets, A and B (expenses only, see Table 6.1). Budget B reflects the full costs of the networks including the Latin American and African regional networks and has been included in the ten-year financial projections for the phased implementation. See Appendix 11 for a more detailed Network budget.
Table 6.1. Network budget (expenses) NETWORK BUDGET
(in US $)
Budget A (minimal budget)
Year 1 and Year 2 (each year)
Budget B
(full budget)
Year 1 and Year 2 (each year) Personnel (salaries &
benefits) $109,200 $152,400 Meetings, Conferences, Workshops $50,000 $65,000 Marketing & Communications $10,000 $30,000 Travel $22,000 $26,000 Research $0 $0 Office Expenses $30,000 $44,000 Overhead (20%) $44,240 $63,480 TOTAL $265,440 $380,880 Personnel
The full budget accounts for 3.5 staff totaling $152,400 including salaries and benefits. See Table 6.2 for a description of the personnel duties.
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