For UK operations, your policy should consider the following:
Waste reduction.
Recycling.
Energy efficiency.
Water management.
Staff travel.
Responsible purchasing.
UK staff training.
Customer communications.
Overseas, you should consider the following:
Accommodation, transport and excursion impacts.
Overseas staff development training.
Local community interaction.
Wildlife guidelines.
You should also consider the following:
Accreditation.
Climate change.
Charity support.
Use our sustainable tourism policy guide to help formulate your policy.
Policy & Management
Writing a sustainable tourism policy allows you to formalise your commitment and effectively integrate change within your business.
A policy will help you develop a clear set of aims, commitments and goals, which can then drive progress and clearly set out how you intend to reduce negative impacts and maintain or improve positive ones. A regular review of the policy will allow you to evaluate your overall performance.
Your policy needs to commence with a clear mission statement or vision, which describes your overall aspirations for sustainable tourism, before setting out your specific commitments and goals. Use our 'How to Write a Sustainable Tourism Policy Guide', found in the green business tools section.
Ongoing monitoring...
As well as developing clear policies, it is essential that your green activities are effectively managed and reviewed and that progress is properly monitored.
The best way to do this is to appoint a specific ‘responsible / sustainable tourism manager’. If available resources do not allow for this, you could form a committee with representatives from different areas of your business in order to spread the workload. However, one person should still be nominated to take overall responsibility within the team, to ensure effective progress is made.
Case Study: Martin Randall
At Martin Randall a responsible tourism committee has been established with great results. Operations Executive Amy Sutcliffe says ‘we’ve found many more ideas and solutions to problems from discussing issues as a team and this has helped to share the workload. It also helps to communicate activities widely – to engage all staff and gather everyone’s input’.