[PCA] INFO: Rainforest Alliance & Eco-Friendly Travel

[Plant Conservation]

Just passing along an interesting press release from the Rainforest
Alliance about some recent initiatives on sustainable tourism.

Olivia
SER/PCA
http://www.nps.gov/plants/

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
November 18, 2003

CONTACT
Steve Kent, 845.758.0097, skent at kentcom.com
Bina Venkataraman, 212.677.1900, bvenkataraman at ra.org

ECO-FRIENDLY TRAVEL OPTIONS TO EXPAND SIGNIFICANTLY IN LATIN AMERICA
San José, Costa Rica -- Thanks to two new initiatives both aimed at making
information about sustainable tourism available to small and medium-sized
businesses, tourists will soon have access to a growing number of
environmentally and socially responsible travel options in Latin America.
A new project coordinated by the Rainforest Alliance and made possible by
a $3 million grant, over four years, from the Multilateral Investment Fund
of the Inter-American Development Bank (MIF/IDB), will provide workshops
and technical training on environmentally and socially sound management to
some 2,000 tourism entrepreneurs and an equal number of indigenous and
community-based operations in Latin America.

"Properly managed tourism can create jobs in some of the world's poorest
and most biodiverse areas, providing people with economic alternatives to
exploiting their resources," explains Rainforest Alliance Executive
Director, Tensie Whelan. Through "best management practice" workshops, the
Rainforest Alliance in association with local partners in Costa Rica,
Guatemala, Belize and Ecuador plan to create a sustainable alternative to
logging, slash-and-burn agriculture and other environmentally destructive
activities in the tropics.

"The approach taken in the project is one of the only development
opportunities in some countries and regions for community-based
organization and for indigenous people who do not have any other options
for improving their situation," explains Santiago Soler, MIF project
leader. "This model could be replicated in other countries, and we would
be interested in supporting that effort."

To achieve the IDB-funded project's objectives and to ensure that small
and medium-sized businesses have access to certification, the first
Sustainable Tourism Certification Network of the Americas was launched on
September 30th in Bahía, Brazil. The network constitutes one of the
components of an international partnership effort led by the Rainforest
Alliance, the World Tourism Organization, The International Ecotourism
Society and the United Nations Environment Program to promote integration
of sustainability into tourism policies and higher environmental and
social standards for tourism. While the growth of nature-related tourism
has spurred the development of an ever-increasing number of independent
certification programs -- all making their own concerted efforts to
control unchecked development and to foster responsibility among so-called
eco-establishments -- the network is intended to encourage dialogue among
these various participants and to act as a regional clearinghouse for
certification information and technical assistance.

Both initiatives grew out of the Sustainable Tourism Stewardship Council
(STSC) feasibility study, coordinated by the Rainforest Alliance and
available at <http://www.rainforestalliance.org/programs/sv/stsc.html>,
which presented its final conclusions in early 2003. The 18-month study
concluded that there is both a need to create regional platforms for
disseminating information about certification and to make technical
assistance available to small and medium-sized tourism businesses.

The Rainforest Alliance works to protect ecosystems and the people and
wildlife that live within them by implementing better business practices
for biodiversity conservation and sustainability.  Companies, cooperatives
and landowners that participate in our programs meet rigorous standards
for protecting the environment, wildlife, workers and local communities.
For more information, visit www.rainforest-alliance.org.