Showcase your impact! Apply now for EXO’s 2024 Sustainability Awards

Great prizes are up for grabs in EXO Found­a­tion’s 2024 Sus­tain­ab­il­ity Awards. Dead­line to nom­in­ate is Septem­ber 15, 2024. 

Identify, support, promote

With Asia as EXO’s home, we’ve seen first-hand how loc­al organ­isa­tions have worked bril­liantly to address grow­ing social and envir­on­ment­al con­cerns, often with little recog­ni­tion for their efforts.

The goal of our Sus­tain­ab­il­ity Awards is to change that by identi­fy­ing, sup­port­ing, and pro­mot­ing exem­plary pro­jects that seek to innov­ate sus­tain­ab­il­ity by provid­ing scal­able solu­tions to chal­lenges we face in the region and around the globe. 

Spe­cific­ally, we would like to recog­nise the fol­low­ing types of organisations:

• Non-profits, NGOs, asso­ci­ations, cooper­at­ives, and social enterprises
• Private com­pan­ies such as excur­sion sup­pli­ers, accom­mod­a­tion pro­viders, and trans­port companies

Inter­ested in apply­ing? Read on to learn about eli­gib­il­ity require­ments, what’s to be gained, and to sub­mit your application. 

By recog­nising, pro­mot­ing, and sup­port­ing win­ners’ efforts, we hope to foster col­lab­or­a­tion that will help drive sus­tain­able prac­tices across the tour­ism industry in two key areas: 

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Planet and people

For tour­ism to achieve its highest poten­tial of being a legit­im­ate force for good, it must address a com­plex myri­ad of con­cerns ran­ging from waste man­age­ment and water pro­tec­tion to wild­life traf­fick­ing and cul­tur­al preservation.

Because all of these con­cerns are equally vital to pro­tect­ing and uplift­ing des­tin­a­tions, we’ve iden­ti­fied three cat­egor­ies under ‘People’ and ‘Plan­et’ respect­ively for which organ­isa­tions can sub­mit their candidacy.

Planet

• Car­bon foot­print reduction
• Mit­ig­a­tion and risk reduction 
• Waste reduction
• Cir­cu­lar eco­nomy innovation 
• Eco­sys­tem restoration 
• Biod­iversity conservation

People

• Loc­al empower­ment and sourcing
• Com­munity development
• Engage­ment
• Pre­ser­va­tion of cul­tur­al her­it­age sites 
• Pro­mo­tion of liv­ing cul­tur­al heritage
• Respons­ible tour­ism practices

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Why participate?

At EXO Found­a­tion, we believe that any pro­ject, wheth­er small or big, can gen­er­ate a sig­ni­fic­ant impact on sus­tain­able development.

We will lever­age our wide net­work in Asia, to reach out to more than hun­dreds of organ­isa­tions and over 5,000 private tour­ism sec­tor actors.

We believe that any pro­ject, big or small, has the poten­tial to have a last­ing pos­it­ive impact on des­tin­a­tions. The fol­low­ing incent­ives are designed to sup­port these efforts. 

• Recog­ni­tion and validation
• Net­work­ing oppor­tun­it­ies and a chance to show­case your work
• An oppor­tun­ity to be judged by a pan­el of inter­na­tion­ally-recog­nised sus­tain­able tour­ism professionals.

Prizes

We are pleased to announce the fol­low­ing prizes:

$30,000 in fin­an­cial sup­port for not-for-profit organ­isa­tions and social enterprises.

• Win­ner for Plan­et – $7,000
• Win­ner for People – $7,000
• Run­ner-up for Plan­et – $5,000
• Run­ner-up for People – $5,000
• Third for Plan­et – $3,000
• Third for People – $3,000

Each win­ner, run­ner-up, and third-placed not-for-profit organ­isa­tion and social enter­prise will also be offered a “Good Tour­ism” sponsored post worth USD 300 (total value: $1,800).

$18,000 in advert­ising and more for private tour­ism com­pan­ies, hotels, and trans­port and excur­sion suppliers.

• Half Page ad in EXplorer: Expose your busi­ness and your sus­tain­ab­il­ity ini­ti­at­ives to blue-chip travel agen­cies and tour oper­at­ors across the world via EXO com­mu­nic­a­tions, pub­lic­a­tions, and social media. 
• One-hour con­sulta­tion ses­sions with Travel without Plastic for the win­ner and runner-up.
• GSTC train­ing ses­sions for two people for the win­ner, one per­son for the run­ner-up, and one per­son for third place in both the Plan­et and People cat­egor­ies, with a total value of USD 4,000. 

And much more!

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How to participate?

To par­ti­cip­ate in the EXO Found­a­tion Sus­tain­ab­il­ity Awards, please take note of the fol­low­ing conditions:

• Geo­graph­ic area: Only pro­jects loc­ated in the fol­low­ing coun­tries are eli­gible for the Sus­tain­ab­il­ity Awards: Cam­bod­ia, Indone­sia, Japan, Laos, Malay­sia, Myan­mar, Thai­l­and, Viet­nam, Singa­pore, South Korea.
• The project/organisation must have a clear over­all com­mit­ment to pos­it­ively impact loc­al com­munit­ies, eco­nom­ies, cul­tures, and environments.
• Inter­ested applic­ants must sub­mit their applic­a­tions by the 15th of Septem­ber.
• In addi­tion to the ques­tion­naire, par­ti­cipants will also be asked to sub­mit neces­sary doc­u­ment­a­tion and high qual­ity pic­tures pitch­ing their projects.

If you would like to par­ti­cip­ate, please fill out the appro­pri­ate ques­tion­naire for your cat­egory and send us the neces­sary doc­u­ment­a­tion and high qual­ity pho­tos of your pro­ject before Septem­ber 15.

» REGISTER for the 2024 Sustainability Awards «

Register here, or for more inform­a­tion, email info@exofoundation.org or vis­it exofoundation.org/sustainabilityawards.

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About EXO Foundation

EXO Found­a­tion is a non-profit organ­isa­tion based in South­east Asia sup­port­ing loc­al grass­roots projects. 

EXO Found­a­tion strives to be a driv­ing force in act­ively fos­ter­ing sus­tain­able devel­op­ment and improv­ing pos­it­ive soci­et­al and envir­on­ment­al changes through the pro­mo­tion of respons­ible tourism. 

It also aims to pave the way for main­stream­ing good prac­tices with­in the travel industry in Asia that will max­im­ise the poten­tial for tour­ism to become a tool for poverty alle­vi­ation and sus­tain­able development. 

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