Geotourism Challenge Opens – $5,000 Prize For Each Winner

Three Sisters From Nepal – one of Last Years Winners CELEBRATING!

The National Geographic Society and Ashoka’s Changemakers today opened the entry process for the second annual “Geotourism Challenge” to showcase how tourism done well sustains, enhances and preserves local culture and the environment.

The competition will identify individuals worldwide who have introduced the most innovative practices in tourism and destination stewardship.

Conducted in partnership with Ashoka’s Changemakers, the global Geotourism Challenge will accept online applications through May 20, 2009. Applicants must demonstrate an innovation that protects destination quality and furthers geotourism, defined by National Geographic as “tourism that sustains or enhances the geographical character of a place — its environment, culture, aesthetics, heritage and the well-being of its residents.”

During this period, anyone can debate, endorse or provide additional information on the entries. A distinguished panel of judges — including Keith Bellows, editor of National Geographic Traveler magazine, and Erika Harms, United Nations Foundation’s executive director for sustainable development — will review the applications and select the finalists. The online community will then vote for the Geotourism Challenge winners, who will be announced this summer. Each winner will receive a cash prize of $5,000.

“This year’s competition theme, ‘Power of Place — Sustaining the Future of Destinations,’ focuses on protecting the locales where history, culture and nature live. We want to recognize business and civic innovators who sustain distinctive places for the enjoyment of current and future generations,” said Jonathan Tourtellot, director of National Geographic’s Center for Sustainable Destinations.

Last year’s Geotourism Challenge produced 320 nominations from 83 countries. The three winners and 12 finalists gathered at National Geographic’s Washington, D.C., headquarters in October to present their innovative business models at the first Geotourism Change Summit attended by 150 country dignitaries and representatives of funding institutions and tourism-industry, conservation and preservation groups.

The competition also created an online community of geotourism activists, ranging from preservationists to developers. All can use competition results and resources to apply holistic geotourism principles locally.

The 2008 winners were a program in Ecuador’s Amazon region to provide Amazonian youth with an academic degree in nature tourism; an outfitter in Nepal that trains women to be trekking professionals in a culture that offers women limited job opportunities; and an eco-lodge in Costa Rica that is teaching native Cabecar Indians how to manage the business in one of the country’s celebrated rain forests.