Businesses and suppliers in the tourism industry are invited to apply for the 2016 World Travel Tourism Council (WTTC) Tourism for Tomorrow Awards.

Destinations, resorts, individual hotels and niche enterprises, as well as global businesses such as airlines and major hotel chains, can submit entries in one of five categories: Community Award, Destination Award, Environment Award, Innovation Award and People Award.

The Community Award is open to any tourism organisation that is working to improve the lives and opportunities for communities where it operates.

The award will be presented to the organisation that has strived to enhance the capacity of the community by providing health and education, empowering local people and increasing the spread of benefits, among other criteria.

To secure the Destination Award, the destination must demonstrate how it has worked exceptionally in any aspect of sustainability, whether economically, socially, culturally, environmentally or politically.

This award aims to celebrate excellence in destination stewardship, and is open to any country, region, state, town or national park that is working to create greater sustainability through its travel and tourism sector.

The Environment Award aims to celebrate the benefits of tourism to the environment. It is open to any travel and tourism organisation that is striving to improve the natural environment through its operations.

It will be presented to the nominee that has worked exceptionally to improve bio-diversity; promote conservation; minimise use of scarce resources; or has developed mitigation and adaptation strategies for climate change.

The Innovation Award will be given for any project that has developed an innovative approach to addressing a particular sustainability challenge.??The innovation can relate to the process, product, delivery or financing of the approach, but it should be new to the world, not simply new to an organisation or destination.

Organisations need to demonstrate exceptional creativity in developing the innovation; the nature and significance of the issue which the innovation has addressed; the scale of the innovation and whether it can be replicated elsewhere; and the overall benefits to sustainability.

The winner of the People Award will be any organisation, or partnership of organisations, which is dedicated to improving career opportunities for people within travel and tourism.

Organisations need to have worked exceptionally to enhance the capacity of individuals and groups of people to enter the travel and tourism sector; to aid the recruitment and retention of under-represented groups; to develop skills for those already employed enabling them to advance in the industry; and to offer fair employment practices.

Further information on the awards, as well as the application form, may be obtained from www.wttc.org/tourism-for-tomorrow-awards. The deadline for the submission of applications is Monday, November 16, 2015.

kim.ramsay-moore@barbados.gov.bb

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