Host: Thompson Okanagan Tourism Association (TOTA)
The Thompson Okanagan Tourism Association (TOTA) is presenting a virtual walkthrough of the Biosphere Sustainable Lifestyle Platform for B.C. tourism companies and how it can help to track progress towards the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) through the BiosphereSustainable.com platform, a sustainability management system for tourism companies.
Why Implement a Sustainability Management System?
A long term sustainability management system helps organizations achieve continuous improvement by addressing social, cultural, economic, quality, human rights, environmental, health and safety, and crisis management issues.
Recording evidence of sustainable actions and having a process in place to monitor continuous sustainability performance improvements enable organizations to align their day to day practices with sustainability principles.
What is a Sustainability Management System?
Sustainability management systems like the Biosphere Sustainable Lifestyle Platform help tourism organizations establish sustainable policies in alignment with the activities of the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals and objectives to measure year on year progress towards the goals and create sustainability plans to educate and showcase their sustainability efforts to internal and external stakeholders.
The system includes:
Easy-to-use digital platform to translate long-term goals into tangible actions and activities
Platform to track, measure, and showcase sustainability efforts to employees, customers, and other stakeholders.
Public profile which highlights sustainable goals, actions, and progress towards the SDGs to travellers from around the world through the new consumer facing website of BiosphereSustainable.com.
Who Should Attend?
Tourism Businesses (Hotels, Wineries, Tour Operators, Restaurants, and any tourism business wishing to improve their sustainability practices)
Biosphere Commitment Program Members
Sustainability managers/coordinators
Anyone curious about the systems approach to sustainable tourism
What You Will Learn:
How to use a Sustainability Management System
How to create a Sustainability Action Plan for your organization
How to track, measure, and upload evidence of your progress towards the 17 SDGs
How to measure progress with sustainability reports
About Biosphere Sustainable
The Biosphere system was founded in 1997 by the Responsible Tourism Institute (RTI) to teach societies to achieve lifestyles and models aligned with global sustainability principles and goals, including the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.
TOTA is collaborating with the Responsible Tourism Institute (RTI) to improve sustainability of tourism businesses in the Thompson Okanagan region.
Free Access to Biosphere Sustainable Lifestyle
Thompson Okanagan Biosphere Committed Companies receive 1 year free access to the Biosphere Sustainable Lifestyle Platform (~$500 CAD value).
Get Involved
For more information about the Thompson Okanagan Biosphere Commitment Program, visit TOTABC.org/biosphere-commitment or email Biophere@TOTABC.com.