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Global Destination Sustainability Index

Meetings & Conventions Prince Edward Island is participating in the Global Destination Sustainability Movement, a collaborative platform established to harness the potential of the meetings, events and tourism industry to expedite the sustainable growth and revitalization of destinations, in conjunction with Destination Canada Business Events. This extensive, year-long program has the mission to inspire, engage and enable Prince Edward Island to become a better place to visit, work and live in.

As a stepping stone to making Prince Edward Island a more sustainable destination, the indexing process has begun for the city of Charlottetown, with plans to extend this indexing across the island.

Governance & Criteria Development

The GDS-Index team consults and gathers input from participating destinations to develop a draft of the criteria, which are reviewed annually. This draft is then thoroughly revised by the GDS-Index Technical Advisory Committee. After incorporating all changes, the GDS-Index team shares the revised criteria with a select group of destination sustainability managers for the final review.

The Technical Advisory Committee (TAC) comprises professionals specializing in sustainable destination management, representing various sectors such as city management, tourism, events, and nonprofit organizations. Their primary responsibility is to offer valuable feedback and innovative suggestions regarding the evolution of the GDS-Index benchmarking criteria, reporting indicators, research, academy, and technical platform development. The committee is composed of 15 members, each serving a two-year term, and individuals interested in joining the committee must submit an application.

Alignment With International Standards

In order to maintain the ongoing quality and applicability of the GDS-Index, the TAC actively align their criteria with internationally recognized standards and initiatives. These include:

  1. UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs): The GDS-Index is dedicated to supporting the UN’s 2030 Agenda and seeks to incorporate the 17 SDGs into destination management worldwide.

  2. GSTC Destination Criteria: The TAC utilize the GSTC-D v2 criteria as a reference to shape the development of the GDS-Index criteria, ensuring that GDS-Index remains pertinent to both business and leisure tourism.

  3. UNWTO Partnership: As an official partner of the UN’s One Planet Sustainable Tourism Programme, the GDS-Index integrate essential elements of the One Planet Vision into the criteria.

By aligning with these standards and initiatives, the TAC strive to enhance the benchmarking categories and methodology of the GDS-Index.

In partnership with: