627 tour operators and travel agents have been selected to participate in the SUSTOUR technical support program financed under the EU COSME program to improve their sustainability performance.
A call for SME applications launched at the beginning of March 2022 to select a minimum of 175 tour operators and travel agents to benefit from a comprehensive technical support program to help them improve their sustainability performance. More than 730 applications were received, and after evaluation by an independent evaluation committee, 627 SMEs from 35 countries were selected and signed up for the support program.
Naut Kusters, Director of ECEAT and lead of the SUSTOUR project said: “We are delighted to see so much interest from tour operators and travel agents across Europe to learn how to make their business and supply chain more sustainable. We have decided to accept three times more companies in the support program than initially planned, to allow a maximum of companies to benefit from the project.”
“In adventure travel, sustainability is among the top priorities,” said Mira Anselmi, Community Director of ATTA, “and we are pleased to see that 38 of our members from Europe were selected to receive the funding to participate in the SUSTOUR program. Through ATTA’s partnership with Travelife, all of our tour operator members globally have the opportunity to access sustainability education and work toward getting certified.”
The technical support program will start in July 2022 and will provide a mix of innovative online trainings, multi-day classroom trainings, intensive coaching (group and individual) as well as peer-to-peer learning – all provided and guided by selected sustainable tourism experts. Companies have been given the choice between obtaining support towards Travelife certification or support in terms of improving specific areas, such as carbon, plastic, and supply chain management, or certification of their shore excursions.
Various events will be organized in conjunction with European trade fairs to allow the selected travel companies to exchange experiences and best practices and to award those companies who successfully reach certification through the SUSTOUR project.
The list of the successful travel companies enrolled in the SUSTOUR technical support program are available from the following website: https://www.travelife.info/sustour/index.php?menu=call-for-smes
About SUSTOUR
SUSTOUR is an EU-funded COSME project the aim of which is to further develop tools and standards to help tour operators and travel agents improve their sustainability performance. It also provides a budget of nearly 600.000€ to roll out an extensive training and certification support scheme for tour operators and travel agents.