The Global Sustainable Tourism Council (GSTC) establishes and manages global sustainable standards, known as the GSTC Criteria. There are two sets: Destination Criteria for public policy-makers and destination managers, and Industry Criteria for hotels and tour operators. These are the guiding principles and minimum requirements that any tourism business or destination should aspire to reach in order to protect and sustain the world’s natural and cultural resources, while ensuring tourism meets its potential as a tool for conservation and poverty alleviation.
The GSTC Criteria form the foundation for GSTC’s role as the global Accreditation Body for Certification Programs that certify hotels/accommodations, tour operators, and destinations as having sustainable policies and practices in place. GSTC does not directly certify any products or services; but it accredits those that do.
The GSTC is an independent and neutral organization, legally registered in the USA as a 501(c)3 non-profit organization that represents a diverse and global membership, including UN agencies, NGO’s, national and provincial governments, leading travel companies, hotels, tour operators, individuals and communities – all striving to achieve best practices in sustainable tourism. It is a virtual organization without a main office, with staff and volunteers working from all six populated continents. Financial support from donations, sponsorship, and membership fees allows us to provide services at low costs and to create, revise, and make available the GSTC Criteria.
Membership is open to all interested parties and does not by itself imply endorsement by the GSTC of the policies and practices of the member organization
he Tanzania Conservation Resource Centre is a non-profit organization which supports researchers and students working in natural resource issues in Tanzania. We have a resource centre in Arusha providing services and information to anyone involved in research and natural resource conservation.
CRC has an office behind the AICC Hospital, on a road opposite the Kibo Palace Hotel. Click here for the map to the office.
CRC is registered as a non-profit organization in Tanzania and in the United States. We rely on contributions from our members as well as in-kind and cash donations from supporting individuals and organizations both locally and internationally.
The Association of Nigerian Geographers (ANG), formerly Nigerian Geographical Association (NGA) is one of the earliest umbrella academic Associations in Nigeria having been formed in 1957. It is a non-profit, scientific and scholarly Association that aims at advancing the study of Geography in Nigeria. Its members share interests in the theory, methods and practice of geography and geographic education. Currently, the Association has more than 1,000 members from all parts of Nigeria and beyond, and represent the interests of Geographers in the country. ANG members are geographers and related professionals who work in the public, private, and academic sectors. They work in a wide range of careers, such as university scholars, lecturers in colleges, teachers of geography, researchers and analysts, planners, cartographers, scientists, non-profit workers, entrepreneurs, businesspeople, bankers, graduate students, retirees and many others.
The Nigerian Geographical Journal (NGJ) and is the Association’s flagship Journal. It has been the major publication outlet of Geographers in Nigeria since the formation of the Association. Annual Conferences Since its formation, the Association continues to hold its conferences annually on different campuses across the country. The Conferences offer opportunities for geographers to present, especially, their research outputs on issues from local to global scale, and on topics in the physical, human and development geography and as well as on methodological issues and technologies such as the Remote Sensing and the Geographical Information System (RS/GIS).
Methodology Lectures are now prominent features during the Conferences so are Field Trips. Moreover, in order to catch-them-young, students of secondary schools age are treated to National Geo-Quiz and also Poster Competitions. At these Annual Conferences, Annual General Meetings (AGM) are held. During such meetings, matters of concern to the geography community are openly discussed and decisions taken. Thus, the Annual Conferences are excellent avenues to, not only present one’s own research works, they also provide avenues for the young and the old to network.
Sustainable Research and Action for Environmental Development (SRADev Nigeria) is a professional, non-governmental, non-profit think tank in environmental health research and development, advocacy and action organization. It seeks to be the voice for environmental development in Africa particularly, Nigeria, while acting as a catalyst, advocate, educator and facilitator to promote the wise use and sustainable development of the environment. The organisation was formed on 7th November, 2003, with its Headquarters in Lagos, but was formally incorporated (CAC No – RC842138) with the Corporate Affairs Commission in Nigeria in 2009 (certificate enclosed).
African Sustainable Energy Association represents and actively promotes Renewable Energy Solutions in the Africa. We focus on Wind, Solar, Biomass, Biogas, Bio Fuels, Green Products, Energy Saving, Alternative Energy, Energy from Waste, Fuel Cell Technologies etc.
The need for a grassroots organization that would galvanize communities across Africa to positively contribute towards sustainable management of natural resources was an idea born out of a discussion by a group of environment and natural resource management practitioners gathered in Arusha Tanzania in 2010. The idea was subsequently shared with other like-minded individuals and culminated in the formation and subsequent registration of Africa Nature Organization as Non-Governmental Organization on the World Wetlands Day 2nd February 2012. Our focus has been to promote sustainable environmental and natural resource management best practices among grassroots communities working closely with civil society organizations, private sector actors and Government.
The Climate Action Network (CAN) is a worldwide network of over 1300 Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) in more than 120 countries, working to promote government and individual action to limit human-induced climate change to ecologically sustainable levels.
CAN members work to achieve this goal through information exchange and the coordinated development of NGO strategy on international, regional, and national climate issues. CAN has regional network hubs that coordinate these efforts around the world.
CAN members place a high priority on both a healthy environment and development that “meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs” (Brundtland Commission). CAN’s vision is to protect the atmosphere while allowing for sustainable and equitable development worldwide.
Suba Environmental Education of Kenya is a Kenyan NGO, funded through Kenya Islands Mission, Inc., a Tennessee State Corporation 501 (c)( 3), founded in 1996 in response to requests of local Kenyans for assistance in addressing their distressing environmental degradation. We are located in greater Suba, along the shores of Lake Victoria.
S.E.E.K. is a grass roots organization which believes that change can only be sustainable from the bottom up as the people themselves understand their problems and initiate and implement solutions. Real abundant life comes through the gospel of Jesus Christ and the faith, hope and love He brings.
S.E.E.K. (K.I.M.) networks with the government and other organizations for optimal results.
SUBA IS A PLACE OF BREATHTAKING NATURAL BEAUTY, and its inhabitants are talented and hospitable. Here lie Ruma National Park, home to the rare Roan Antelope, and the vast Lake Victoria, a great natural resource. This is a land of endless potential
YET IGNORANCE AND LACK OF ENVIRONMENTAL STEWARDSHIP HAVE BROUGHT DEVASTATION. People are trapped in a web of hopelessness because of the great environmental degradation.
TROUBLING FACTS OF GREATER SUBA:
- One fourth of its 210,000 inhabitants are orphaned children.
- HIV/AIDS prevalence is 26%
- Life expectancy is 37 years.
- The majority of its people live on 75 cents (U.S.A.) a day or less.
- The rate of unemployment is 40%
- Deforestation has resulted in climate change with an alarming decrease in food production.
- Pollution of Lake Victoria and poor fishing practices have diminished fish populations.
Our Vision
We envision a people-centered globalization that values the rights of workers and the health of the planet; that prioritizes international collaboration as central to ensuring peace; and that aims to create a local, green economy designed to embrace the diversity of our communities.
In a world where the economics of quantity fuels corporate power and political greed, the elite are reaping profits while working people and the planet are left to pay the price. In response to worldwide degradation caused by this system of elite globalization, Global Exchange envisions an alternative economics of quality centered upon protecting international human rights to ensure that the cost of globalization does not come at the expense of us all.
Our Mission
Global Exchange is an international human rights organization dedicated to promoting social, economic and environmental justice around the world. We take a holistic approach to creating change and as an education and action resource center, we advance our vision by working to ensure our members and constituents are empowered locally and connected globally to create a just and sustainable world.
We realize that in order to advance social, environmental and economic justice we must transform the global economy from profit-centered to people-centered, from currency to community.
Our Work
Global Exchange is tackling some of the most critical issues of our time— from limiting corporate power and greed to oil addiction and global climate change, from the exploitation of the current global economy to the creation of the local green economy. Our campaigns inspire people across the U.S. and around the world to resist injustice, envision alternatives, and take action. Click here to learn more.
Global Exchange was founded 30 years ago to promote human rights, justice and sustainability around the world. We envisioned building a robust U.S. movement capable of creating change from the grassroots, powered by people-to-people ties. To change the world, we started making change at home.
Our Successes
Over the last 30 years, we have won victories big and small on behalf of workers, small farmers, the environment and vulnerable communities around the world. We helped build a thriving Fair Trade movement. We championed campaigns to stop and end wars, challenge corporate power and bring attention to the exploitation of the current global economy. We monitored elections in Colombia, Mexico, and in the U.S. We built the largest sustainability event (Green Festival) in the country from the ground up and trained young adults in green careers. We have organized social conscious travel around the globe on our Reality Tours. See more from our 30 years. And we are still going strong!
Join us
By joining Global Exchange today, you will support an unstoppable movement for change.
The Grevy’s Zebra Trust (GZT) is the only organisation in the world with a mission focused solely on conserving the Grevy’s zebra. Recognising that the survival of the Grevy’s zebra depends on its ability to coexist with people living in northern Kenya, GZT believes these communities must be at the centre of designing and driving conservation efforts. GZT therefore works in partnership with communities from monitoring Grevy’s zebra through citizen science, to co-designing site-specific and tailored solutions to threats facing the species. In all of its work, GZT seeks ways to use data and information to inform decisions and solution for positive conservation outcomes.
The Sierra Club is the most enduring and influential grassroots environmental organization in the United States. We amplify the power of our 3.5+ million members and supporters to defend everyone’s right to a healthy world.b
In 1983, both black rhinos and northern white rhinos declared extinct throughout Uganda. Therefore, our purpose is to return rhinos, a vital aspect of both environmental and cultural heritage, back into Uganda, through our breeding and release program.
Located in Ziwa Rhino Sanctuary, the 7 000 hectares of savannah and woodlands has provided us with land for the rhinos. Owned by Captain Joe Roy, a Ugandan citizen, a land usage license has been agreed to give us sole usage rights for thirty (renewable) years.
From this, the first six southern white rhinos were translocated in 2005/6, with four from Kenya, and two from Disney Animal Kingdom (USA). As it was northern white rhinos that once populated Uganda’s national parks, our rhinos are technically considered an exotic breed!
It was four years before the first rhino was born in March 2008. Unfortunately, Bella’s baby was a still born.
The next year – 24th June 2009 – we had a healthy male calf, making history by being the first rhino born in Uganda in approximately 30 years! He was named Obama, making history, with his mother from the United States and his father from Kenya.
Our Work
Protecting the Amazon and our climate by supporting indigenous peoples
Since 1996, Amazon Watch has protected the rainforest and advanced the rights of indigenous peoples in the Amazon Basin. We partner with indigenous and environmental organizations in campaigns for human rights, corporate accountability, and the preservation of the Amazon’s ecological systems.
Our work is focused on three main priorities:
Stop Amazon Destruction | Advance Indigenous Solutions | Support Climate Justice
Envirocare is non-profit making, non partisan, non governmental registered organization founded in 1993.Our primary target groups as well as main stakeholders are the communities in which we work.Below are our core functions as an organization. Below are our core functions as an organization:
The Council for Renewable Energy Nigeria (CREN) was born in November 2004 out of the spirit of Energetic Solutions – An international renewable energy conference held in Nigeria. This conference included representatives from Africa, the Americas and Europe, and was a follow up to the World Summit on Sustainable Development and Bonn Renewables conference to address the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) and issues of energy and development.
During the conference, Nigerian government, private, civil sector representatives came together to combine their efforts to envision a renewable energy future for the country. Their vision was encapsulated in the Calabar Declaration, an action plan for renewable energy in Nigeria.
Founded and comprised of stakeholders from all sectors of renewable energy , the Council For Renewable Energy Nigeria is in a unique position to effectively build partnerships to facilitate the large scale implementation of renewable energy in Nigeria.
The Ministry of Environment & Forestry is a ministry of the Government of South Sudan. The incumbent minister is Mrs. Josephine NAPWON, while Mr.Joseph Africano Bartel serves as the Under Secretary
Vision
“Clean, healthy and safe environment for the people of South Sudan”
Mission
“To provide policy guidance, direction and coordination of all stakeholders for protection, conservation and sustainable management of the environment”
The live animal exportation tradebreaks every animal welfare law ever written, but yet is allowed to continue, despite tipping the scale as one of the cruellest activities created by man on planet earth.
There are approximately 20 countries which export live animals for slaughter, with France, Canada and Australia exporting the most cattle. Australia has, over the past 30 years, exported over 2.5 million live sheep. New Zealand ceased live exports in 2003 after ongoing public protests, and a series of horror events ending with a ship carrying 57 000 New Zealand sheep being rejected by Saudi Arabia. Unable to port anywhere, most of the sheep died. Survivors were “gifted” to Eritrea, where they were slaughtered in primitive abattoirs. After this atrocity, New Zealand stopped exports.
The EU developed laws pertaining to travel conditions and care of live export animals, but there is no humane, or “cruelty free” way of loading, then transporting, thousands of animals in ships for weeks on end, and it is preposterous to think of the hours spent by humans writing welfare laws thinking that they could make it so. The global live animal trade is worth billions of US Dollars, but the extreme cruelty is what the public doesn’t see. Animals which could be delivered “on hook” to feed a community, end up dead en route and are tossed overboard, making them worthless to anyone.
In South Africa, 61 000 sheep were recently loaded onto a ship (the Al Shuwaikh) in East London destined for middle eastern destinations including Kuwait, where there are no animal welfare laws at all. The conditions on board were beyond comprehension and again, the South African Animal Protection Act was ignored, while the sheep suffered horrific handling and on board conditions before the ship had even left the dock. The SA Government has ignored welfare’s written reports and welfare concerns. They ignored objections and protests, and signed a contract for 600 000 animals to be exported. And so the cruelty will continue.
ARO condemns live exportation of animals from SA, and joins with other welfare movements in SA to publicise, condemn and, we hope, ban the live exportation of animals from South Africa. The only way to stop it is to confront it. We ask for your support along the way.
The United Nations Human Settlements Programme (Habitat), established in 1978, is the lead agency within the UN system for coordinating activities in the field of human settlement development. It also serves as the focal point for monitoring progress on implementation of the Habitat Agenda – the global plan of action adopted at the Second United Nations Conference on Human Settlements (Habitat II), held in Istanbul, Turkey in 1996.
As of 1 January 2002, the UNCHS (Habitat) and its governing body has been elevated to a fully fledged United Nations Human Settlements Programme, to be known as UN-HABITAT. With its new status, UN-HABITAT will be in a better position to help governments and other partners to implement the Habitat Agenda, and to meet the Millennium Declaration’s goal of improving the lives of at least 100 million slum dwellers by the year 2020.
As a small agency with global responsibilities, UN-HABITAT needs to find ways of maximizing its impact; its resources must be focused, and policy principles and approaches must be strategic. These principles are derived from UN-HABITAT’s own experience of what works, and also from experience of its partners. National governments, local authorities, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), community organizations and the private sector are UN-HABITAT’s partners.
In addition to its advocacy and monitoring function, UN-HABITAT also plays an important role in providing technical assistance to countries and cities in the areas of urban governance, housing, environmental management, disaster mitigation, post-conflict rehabilitation, urban safety, water management and poverty reduction.
Sustainia is a sustainability advisory group and digital studio working to accelerate action towards a sustainable future. We work with people who are changing the world for the better, helping them integrate sustainability into their core by developing cutting-edge strategies, building engaging digital solutions, and amplifying their messages with impact.
SPANA has worked with ANAW since 2012, delivering humane education through our network of animal welfare clubs.
Last year, 2,050 children took part in the clubs. 41 teachers attended training sessions, with 31 achieving an ICHE qualification.
Partner: University of Nairobi
Project type: Veterinary and education
Location: Nairobi
SPANA is working with the University of Nairobi to:
- provide free veterinary treatment for 300 working oxen
- evaluate owner knowledge and attitudes in order to design effective training
- train 10 animal health professionals
- provide community training for at least 500 people
Our Liaison Offices in New York, New Delhi, Tokyo and Vienna continue to serve as contact points for ACUNS members traveling to those locations and interested in making connections to the United Nations based organizations in those cities, and to the local scholarly communities there.
The individual lead Liaison Officers at these locations are ACUNS members, either in the academic or practitioner communities, who have volunteered their services to help support members of our global network.
In some cases, the Liaison Offices also organize functions – lectures, seminars, workshops, and conferences – in cooperation with local UN bodies, other international organizations, NGOs, and academic institutions. The Vienna Liaison Office has been especially active in arranging or participating in such programming, supported by an energetic group of young volunteer interns.