At the beginning of February Rogers & Co AB delivered a Rapid Assessment and Gap Analysis Evaluation of Destination Järvsö’s readiness to comply with Global Sustainable Tourism Council Destination Criteria.
The report assessed and graded the destination’s compliance with GSTC Destination Criteria (and suggested Indicators) and provided analysis and recommendations on GSTC Criteria compliance that needed improvement. Case studies from Destination Røros in Norway and from the Gold Certified EarthCheck Destination of the Snæfellnes Peninsula, in Iceland’s Western Fjords were used to illustrate options, examples and case studies.
Having now received the rapid assessment report of Järvsö’s GSTC Destination Criteria compliance level the destination of Järvsö needs to collectively decided how to move forward and take ‘the next step’ in implementing a sustainability policy and benchmarking system that will improve the destination’s Environmental, Cultural, Social and Economic outcomes.
Options include readily available sustainable destination programmes such as the only GSTC Accredited Certification for Sustainable Destinations through EarthCheck, or waiting and hoping that a national initiative may pledge to adopt GSTC Destination Criteria and work towards a national standard for Sustainable Destinations as exists in Norway.
The emergence of Järvsö as a possible Sustainable Destination ‘pilot project’ that could be rolled out to the rest of Ljusdal Municipality or throughout Gävleborg län is an exciting prospect.
For more information on Sustainable Destination Programme options and solutions contact Neil Rogers at neil@rogersco.se