Tips for rural destination managers on improving sustainability

At last week’s Global Sustainable Tourism Summit my goal was to bring as much value home for regional and remote destination managers as I could, so I asked everyone I chatted to for their top tip for you:

“If a rural destination manager wanted to improve sustainability - whatever that meant for them - and asked you for a tip, what would you tell them?
What have you seen that works? (or doesn’t work!)”

Here’s what I heard.

Set a vision and define why you want to improve sustainability

• Articulate a clear vision, and know exactly why you want to improve sustainability. Anchor every future decision directly to this purpose. For example, one of our motivators was to save a certain species.
  — Timothy Teo, Borneo Eco Tours & Adam McEwan, Hero Experiences

• Establish a clear narrative and purpose statement early on, because saying it and reading it repeatedly helps both you and your stakeholders truly believe it. (For example, Unilever’s vision is to demonstrate how a purpose-led, future-fit business model can drive superior performance.) 
  — Diego Vidal Guzman, Australia Inbound by Orange Journeys

• Think commercially, such as how to generate sales for operators.
  — Dana Rohan, Nourish Group

Measure a baseline

• Establish a clear baseline by consulting stakeholders to identify current gaps and to determine exactly where sustainability uplift is needed.
  — Tamara Siemionow, Wet Tropics Management Authority

• Measure local sentiment via a Community Net Promoter Score to understand how tourism is impacting residents' lives. Ask: “How is tourism doing for you?” (a score of 1 to 5) then “What made you give that score?” This will give you quantitative and qualitative data to support your journey and measuring outcomes.
  — Dana Rohan, Nourish Group

• Define what good tourism and what bad tourism looks like for your area, so you understand how to protect what locals value (such as a quiet life and access to nature) while still supporting business needs.
  — Daniela Ruiz, Carbonhalo

• Set realistic goals. Set a target for a number of certified operators
  — Jen Gearing, Rejenerate & Dana Rohan, Nourish Group

Use your skills for good

• Figure out how to use your skills, such as in marketing and communications, for good. For example, what tourism for good project could you deliver that delivers on your passion for creativity and sustainability?
  — Jen Sharpe, Plastic Free Noosa

Connect the players

Partnerships and relationships are very important.

• Find the people who already share your values, those who care, and those want to work with you on sustainability, and start your journey with them.
  — Diana Mulholland, TEQ, Jana Apih, GoodPlace & Kristy Malapa, Untamed Escapes

• Get your destination’s core organisations, such as Council, the RTO, the Chamber of Commerce, and National Parks, on the same page to drive sustainability together from a unified hub. Form a Destination Stewardship Alliance Advisory Group with diverse representatives from conservation, business, and dark sky tourism.
  — Simone Novello, Blue Mountains City Council & Corinne Lewis, Ecotourism Australia

• Consult operators to understand daily operations, then create a collaborative cluster of engaged operators.
  — Tammy Kelly, Wild Light Experiences

• Break down internal silos within local government to enable crucial cross-departmental communication, such as getting the tourism and waste teams talking to one another.
  — Nadine Schramm, Ecotourism Australia & Caroline Worton, YHA Australia

Engage your community

• Let locals (those who live in your destination and therefore have a big stake in its future) ‘own’ ideas rather than feeding them your good ideas. And then enable and support them to realise their ideas.
  — Aromica Bhattacharya, Travalyst

• To secure genuine community buy-in, take rural communities on the journey by hosting town-hall-style gatherings. Highlight the social benefits of sustainable initiatives.
  — Caroline Densley, Diverse Travel Australia & Felicity Stevens, Sustainable Hosting

• Give the community exactly what they want rather than something else. Use local peer champions to share their authentic stories and inspire others.
  — Sally Smith, South Australian Tourism Commission & Caroline Worton, YHA Australia

Engage and incentivise operators

• Start with the operators who have a big impact, whose improvements will make a difference. Go knock on their doors and talk with them one on one. You’ll make progress over time. Use financial benefit or business reputation as a hook, but find what is most meaningful to each operator/team.
  — Diego Vidal Guzman, Australia Inbound by Orange Journeys

• Don’t overlook the ability of micro-operators to make meaningful changes, and remind businesses that if they aren't in the room (engaged in consultations), they get left out of decision-making.
  — Tammy Kelly, Wild Light Experiences & Tony Charter, Tony Charter and Associates

• Engage operators by talking about what matters to them: $$ (operational savings and increased bookings), such as by pointing out that sustainable practices can lower insurance costs, reduce energy, water and waste bills, or win extra points in tourism awards.
  — Daniela Ruiz, Carbonhalo & Felicity Stevens, Sustainable Hosting

• Find each business's specific key motivator, whether that is securing funding, protecting a particular species to keep visitors coming, or accessing reduced prices on local permits.
  — Diego Vidal Guzman, Australia Inbound by Orange Journeys & Daniela Ruiz, Carbonhalo

• Share the stories and successes of local peer champions.
  — Sally Smith, South Australian Tourism Commission

• Remove bureaucratic restrictions that stifle innovation, and actively support the innovative frontrunners who are ready to make a tangible change.
  — Caroline Worton, YHA Australia

Planning, certification and structured programs

• Take a clear solution to businesses and encourage them to focus on mastering one thing at a time, like reducing landfill or fuel use. This will reduce overwhelm.
  — Daniela Ruiz, Carbonhalo & Jen Sharpe, Plastic Free Noosa

• Use a structured certification program as a practical tool to give operators ideas on how to run their businesses.
  — Jana Apih, GoodPlace

• Provide funding for sustainability certification.
  — Zoe Abrahams, Southern Cross Tours

• Offer a structured development program for a cohort of operators (the ‘cohort’ part is important), similar to a 'Trade Ready' development program. Include workshops, hands-on business integration, and educational famils.
  — Zoe Abrahams, Southern Cross Tours & Dana Rohan, Nourish Group

• Provide hands-on support: hold operators' hands through the transition using simple, accessible tools like the WELCOME Framework (which has easy ideas on how to improve accessibility for people with disability) to enable achievement of low-hanging fruit.
  — Kathryn Galpin, South Australian Tourism Commission & Sally Smith, South Australian Tourism Commission

• Show (measured) outcomes and changes.
  — Daniela Ruiz, Carbonhalo

Engage visitors

• Introduce immersive, hands-on visitor experiences to make the visitor feel like the hero of their sustainable travel choice.
  — Adam McEwan, Hero Experiences

• Incentivise sustainable visitor behavior through loyalty rewards, annual perks, or status programs like the Perisher 'Epipass'.
  — Simone Novello, Program Leader Visitor Economy, Blue Mountains City Council

• Partner with major operators like hotels to introduce destination-wide initiatives like Fiji's 'Loloma Hour' which encourages visitors to gift an hour of their stay to giving back to the local environment. Enable visitors to do this easily.
  — Sera Vada, DETSI

• Launch creative visitor give-back initiatives, such as targeted beach clean-ups or marine citizen science programs under a unified regional brand identity.
  — Jen Sharpe, Plastic Free Noosa

Practical implementation and storytelling

• Encourage operators to use photos and clear descriptions in promotions to clearly articulate sustainability initiatives.
  — Felicity Stevens, Sustainable Hosting

• Encourage operators to turn what they are doing to be sustainable into a compelling story, such as that they aren’t mowing the grass around the pool so grass seeds can support insects and birds.
  — Jana Apih, GoodPlace

• Set up practical projects like commercial composting programs for local cafe green waste, and community bush tucker gardens for foraging experiences.
  — Jeff Gillies and Rachel, Coral Expeditions

Thank you, legends!