Second Indigenous Tourism and Biodiversity Website Award – 2010

When ITBW meets Eyjafjallajokull!

Due to the volcanic ash cloud, the Award organizers and participants had to cancel their travels to the Reisepavillon in Berlin however, the Secretariat and Planeta.com prepared two videos (available on this page) that were shown on 22 April, at the opening ceremony and press conference of the Reisepavillon. The winners and finalists will be invited to participate at the next ITBW Award ceremony, which will be held during the Ecotourism and Sustainable Tourism Conference (ESTC), in Portland, OR, USA, from September 08th to 10th, 2010. More details on Planeta.com, ESTC Conference web site and ITBW on Facebook. See advert in the right column.

Winner of the judged 2010 ITBW Award

Nutti Sami Siida, a company that arranges nature and culture tours based on the Sami culture. Owners Nils Torbjörn Nutti and Carina Pingi are both Sami from Gabna Sameby, Sweden.

Winner of the popular count 2010 ITBW Award

TIME Unlimited Tours from New Zealand, operated by the Maori-European couple Ceillhe Tewhare Teneti Hema Sperath and Néill Sperath, and providing personalized and interactive Auckland & Maori Indigenous Cultural Tours.

Other finalists were:

Brambuk National Park and Cultural Centre, which introduces visitors to the Grampians National Park (Gariwerd) in Victoria, Australia;

Kakadu Culture Camp, which is owned and operated by Fred and Jenny Hunter, Aboriginal people from Australia’s Kakadu National Park;

Chalalan Ecolodge, which is 100 per cent run and owned by the indigenous community in Bolivia;

Squamish Lil'wat Cultural Centre, which shares the cultures of two distinct indigenous cultures in a visionary partnership on shared traditional territories in Canada;

Te Urewera Treks, which strives to operate in a sustainable manner in accord with Maori principles and values in New Zealand ;and

Xe Pian National Protected Area, which features tours and accommodation owned and managed by local communities in Xe Pian NPA, southern Laos.

Applications were received from 10 countries (Australia, Bolivia, Canada, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, Mexico, Micronesia, New Zealand, Pakistan and Sweden). Over 400 people cast their vote, examining the 14 websites that fit the ambitious criteria set on Planeta.com’s wiki site. Additionally, a jury composed of six internationally recognized experts in indigenous and sustainable tourism voted using the same criteria.

Visit the main host page of the Award at: Planeta.com ITBW

Click here to read the press release on the event. Tweet or find out what others are tweeting about the award. The hashtag is: #itbw10. Visit Facebook to have more details on the ESTC events!

The objectives

As part of the CBD programmes of work on Tourism and Biodiversity, and Article 8(j): Traditional Knowledge, Innovations and Practices and a complementary project to the CBD workshop series, the Secretariat of the CBD, in partnership with Planeta.com, and the generous support of the Heidehof Foundation, is hosting the second Indigenous Tourism and Biodiversity Website (ITBW) Award for 2010, the International Year for Biological Diversity.

The award is aimed at private tourism services, owned and operated by indigenous and local communities embodying traditional lifestyles, and its main objectives are:

• To motivate candidates to improve their online communication on biological and cultural diversity
• To highlight their best practices in managing tourism in a biodiversity-friendly way
• To raise operators and public’s awareness on biodiversity

The award is presented to indigenous tourism operations for their websites that promotes sustainable practices and biodiversity conservation, and educates visitors on cultural protocols. Globally, indigenous communities are the stewards of significant amounts of land with rich biodiversity, and many of them promote sustainable tourism as an additional livelihood option and as a means to share their culture and educate visitors on traditional knowledge. By identifying best practices in this segment, the CBD and Planeta.com, with the support of the Heidehof Foundation, aim to enhance the biodiversity component of indigenous tourism products, to aggregate value to their operations, and to contribute to awareness raising on biodiversity with visitors and hosts alike. This year, the award is part of the celebrations of 2010 as the International Year on Biodiversity.

The first version of this award was given out for 2008, to two leading indigenous operators (see the webpage). This initiative complements other activities of the CBD in building capacity of indigenous and local communities, such as the workshop series on indigenous tourism, biodiversity and web-based technologies (click here for more details).

Timeline

Winners of popular and jury voting will receive the award in September 2010 at a sustainable tourism trade fair, the Ecotourism and Sustainable Tourism Conference (ESTC), in Portland, OR, USA, from September 08th to 11th, 2010. More details on ESTC Conference web site. Winners will receive technical support and participate in a workshop on innovative Web-based tools for marketing and communications, facilitated by webmaster Ron Mader . A publication on the award, its winners and the lessons learned, will be launched at the Conference, and distributed in many networks and on the Web.

Criteria

The Indigenous Tourism and Biodiversity Website Award creates an opportunity for indigenous people and communities to improve their websites. Among the criteria for selection, the website should ...

• be regularly updated
• link to other relevant sites
• reflect indigenous ownership, authenticity and heritage
• encourage sustainable livelihoods, respect of life on earth
• be user-friendly
• be trustworthy
• provide clear contextual information
• have text in English
• add the award logo

Bonus points to applicants making the most of Web 2.0 channels!

The winners and the prize

The award will be presented to an indigenous tourism operation for having a website that promotes sustainable practices and educates visitors on cultural protocols and biodiversity conservation. The ITBW award represents a specific opportunity for indigenous and local communities to be showcased and recognized.

The two winners will be selected, one by a jury panel of experts and another by online popular vote.

The winners will be invited to travel to and receive their prizes at a major international trade fair on sustainable tourism, the ESTC Conference in Portland, Oregon, 8-11 September 2010.

The ITBW 2010 Award prizes to the winners also include:

• An award ceremony at a press conference during the trade fair in Portland
• Business meetings with outbound international tour operators
• A training workshop on Web 2.0 technologies for special interest tourism marketing offered by Ron Mader of Planeta.com
• Featured in a colour brochure prepared by the Secretariat to be distributed widely

Contact

Ron Mader editor@planeta.com