Dr. Janet Cochrane's responsibilities include Income-generating consultancy and research, academic research, and lecturing and supervision at higher levels in planning, management, marketing and commercial success of ecotourism, tourism in protected areas, and community-based tourism. For further information please visit www.leedsmet.ac.uk

Dr. Xavier Font's education is in tourism management and marketing, and his research focuses on marketing and management of ecolabels in tourism and hospitality. He has co-authored and co-edited three books in English (Tourism ecolabelling: certification and promotion of sustainable management, Environmental management for rural tourism and recreation, Forest tourism and recreation) and one in Spanish (Marketing of tourist destinations: analysis and development) and published in a variety of academic journals. For further information please visit www.leedsmet.ac.uk

Prof. Harold Goodwin researches on tourism, local economic development and poverty reduction, conservation and responsible tourism and teaches Masters and PhD students as well as the industry, local communities, governments, and conservationists. Harold also undertakes consultancy and evaluations for companies, NGOs, governments, and international organisations. For further information please visit www.haroldgoodwin.info

Benjamin Carey is a sustainable tourism expert with 20 years professional experience in 40 countries, ranging from mass market resorts to emerging ecotourism destinations.

In 2002, he established Dunira Strategy (www.dunira.com), which focuses on the sustainable development and environmental management of tourism and engages a broad range of stakeholders, especially in Eastern Europe and the Middle East.

Benjamin has a particular interest in capacity building for emerging destinations and those recovering from conflict. Previously he developed revenue management systems for Thomson Holidays and managed a large marketing team at Airtours. Recent and current activities have involved projects in Russia, Armenia, Georgia, Poland, Croatia, Ireland, Scotland, Iran, Lebanon and Rwanda. Clients include the British Foreign Office, International Business Leaders Forum, United Nations Environment Programme, The Travel Foundation and WWF, as well as heritage organisations and environment agencies, local authorities, tourist boards and ministries, and regional and international development agencies.

An active member of Slow Food www.slowfood.com and Tourism Concern www.tourismconcern.org.uk, Benjamin is a visiting fellow at Leeds Metropolitan University, appointed member of the Foreign Office's Consular Stakeholder Panel, founding member of the UNESCO Scotland Committee and chairman of Tourism Society Scotland www.tourismsociety.org

Based in Kathmandu Nepal with over 30 years experience in the sector, Lisa Choegyal is an authority on planning, operating and marketing tourism, particularly pro-poor sustainable tourism. With Tourism Resource Consultants Ltd. (TRC) of Wellington, New Zealand she has undertaken consultancy roles using tourism for development with international agencies, NGOs and the private sector throughout the Asia Pacific region.

With a background in the private sector, Lisa worked for over 20 years with the Tiger Mountain Group Nepal and is currently still associated as an adviser. One of Asia's foremost nature and adventure tourism operators, Tiger Mountain pioneered operations such as Tiger Tops Jungle Lodge in Royal Chitwan National Park and Mountain Travel Nepal, the first trekking and mountaineering company in the Himalaya. The Tiger Mountain Group offers river rafting and various specialised nature, adventure and village tourism operations throughout Nepal, India and Tibet. As Director of Marketing with responsibility for sales promotion, public relations and quality control, Lisa has had extensive experience in planning, product development, marketing, promotions and sales. She retains strong networks of industry contacts in the major source markets of Australasia, Europe and North America. She has worked on related areas of environmental preservation, conservation awareness, and community, government and media liaison. She is an author, photographer, and editor of travel and guidebook publications. She is widely experienced in production coordination and location management for documentary and feature films.

Lisa has been part of teams for the Sarawak Tourism Masterplan 1992-1993, the Sabah Tourism Masterplan 1995-1996, and the Qomolangma Nature Preserve Tourism Masterplan Tibet in 1996. In 2000-2001 she led a team of 10 consultants based in Kathmandu preparing the ADB's Nepal Ecotourism Project. She has helped develop the Bhutan National Ecotourism Strategy, and Nepal Ecotourism Strategy and Marketing Plan, the National Ecotourism Strategy for the Philippines, and the Kenya Tourism Marketing Strategy. From 2002-2005 for DFID Nepal she monitored the Tourism for Rural Poverty Alleviation Programme (TRPAP) in Nepal. In 2004 to 2006, Lisa was Marketing and Product Development Specialist on the ADB SASEC (South Asia Subregional Economic Cooperation) team preparing and assisting in the implementation of the Tourism Development Plan for Bangladesh, Bhutan, India and Nepal and Sri Lanka, and was on the HRD and Capacity Building in the Tourism Sector team. She has worked on village tourism in Viet Nam, mangrove tourism in southern China, and for ADB was recently in Afghanistan planning ecotourism in selected protected areas with local communities, and preparing Afghanistan National Tourism Development Strategy.

Robert Cleverdon has worked for 35 years as a tourism consultant, his involvement covering studies in: planning the development of the tourism sector in countries throughout the world; likely trends in the future demand for different types of travel; and the development and marketing of particular products.

After employment with Economist Intelligence Unit, from the mid 1980s he has focused on tourism planning and marketing consultancy to serve developing countries in the encouragement, establishment and operation of their tourism sectors. Assistance has been given both at the macro level working with national and provincial/state governments and at the micro level working with individual developers/entrepreneurs. He has a strong interest in applying the principles of fair trade to the travel and tourism sectors. He has been the WTO's advisor on its global tourism forecasting research for the past ten years.

Apart from consultancy, he has organised and participated in training courses on tourism development planning and marketing; and worked with a number of universities in designing, developing and leading Masters level international tourism development courses, drafting distance learning tourism course material, and acting as external examiner.

Andrew Eaglen is an expert in development strategies for tourism organisations and destinations. Recent consultancy work has included the development of a Tourism master plan for S.W. China in collaboration with key stakeholders. Previous experience has included business and management consultancy for public, private and not for profit organisations in addition to business development action research and research project management at a range of UK Universities. He is also currently the Director of Postgraduate International Tourism Management.

Nicole is Managing Director of 'mascontour', a Tourism Consulting & Regional Planning consultancy. Nicole has worked on the micro and macro level with local communities, the public and private sector and NGOs. As a social anthropologist her main work has been in project management, participatory methodologies, research, planning and monitoring. She has organized various conferences and training workshops on these issues. Nicole studied Social Anthropology and Communication/Journalism at the University of Göttingen/ Germany and wrote her M.A. Thesis after a six-month field research in 1990 on the impacts of Tourism in Goa/India. She has several years of experience as Tourism Consultant focusing on Rural and Cultural Tourism, Community-based Tourism, Tourism Management in Protected Areas and Tourism & Poverty Reduction.

She lived for six years in Bangkok/Thailand and worked there as a study tour guide, travel photographer and tourism consultant in the region focussing on community-based tourism. Afterwards she joined for a period of two years the Department of Protected Areas (SERNAP) in La Paz/Bolivia where she organized in cooperation with ICRT a seminar on "Pro-Poor-Tourism" for local tourism consultants. Currently she is a visiting lecturer in Sustainable Tourism at the University of Applied Sciences in Eberswalde near Berlin (Master Programme).

Nicole has published as well several articles and books on tourism, participation and development, among them "The Training Manual for Community Based Tourism" ("2003) and a Manual on Tourism Activities for German Development Agencies: "Tourismus als Handlungsfeld der deutschen Entwicklungszusammenarbeit" (2007).

Nicole is especially interested in facilitating the implementation of pro-poor-tourism.

Heidi is a senior consultant with Edge Tourism Solutions based in Cape Town and Director of the ICRT-South Africa. Heidi was formerly a Senior Lecturer at the Cape Technikon, Cape Town, teaching "Tourism Development" at undergraduate and post-graduate levels (1994- 1998). She subsequently published a textbook on 'Tourism Development' written for Southern African and developing country students (Oxford University Press, 2002) and is now working on the second edition. Heidi became involved with the International Centre for Responsible Tourism as a contributor to the South African Responsible Tourism Guidelines and the Manual.

Heidi is a qualified urban and regional planner and specialises in tourism destination planning frameworks and tourism impact assessments. She has undertaken consultancy and research for the Department for International Development, South African Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism, Western Cape Provincial Government, Gauteng Tourism Authority, Krasnodar Krai Government (Russian Federation), Robben Island World Heritage Site, City of Cape Town and various other local authorities in South Africa, various private sector clients.

Prof. Mike Robinson holds the Chair of Tourism and Culture at Leeds Metropolitan University. He is also Director of the Centre for Tourism and Cultural Change (www.tourism-culture.com) - an international research body that carries out work on the changing relationships between tourism and culture.

For the past 17 years Mike's work has focused upon research in the field of tourism and culture. He has published books on Tourism and Cultural Conflicts, Literature and Tourism, Cultural Festivals and Tourism, and the Politics of Cultural Tourism. Mike has edited a further 11 books on tourism. In 2005 Mike was commissioned by UNESCO to research and write a major report on Tourism, Culture and Sustainable Development. Mike is founder and Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Tourism and Cultural Change, an Associate Editor of the Scandinavian Journal of Tourism and is on the board of three other international journals. He is Series Editor of the Tourism and Cultural Change Book Series.

Mike founded and is a member of the research committee of the International Festivals and Events Association (IFEA) of Europe, and co-founded the Festivals Special Interest Group of ATLAS. Mike's research interests include heritage tourism, cultural festivals and tourist/tourism narratives and tourist behaviour. Mike has worked on tourism projects and tourism development strategy in the UK, Spain, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon and India. His recent research, funded by the USA's Social Science Research Council, focuses on tourism and heritage relationships in the Middle East. He is a Board member/Trustee of the Council for British Research in the Levant, an Institute of the British Academy. He has delivered keynote presentations, public lectures and workshops on various aspects of the tourism – culture relationships in Taiwan, India, Jordan, Syria, Spain, Czech Republic, Canada, and the USA.

Dr Shaun Russell is an environmental scientist with 30 years of experience in the field of conservation and development, and protected area management. Dr Russell has been involved in tourism-related projects on all continents, including Antarctica. His earlier career was spent mainly in Africa, where he contributed to many wildlife tourism initiatives, including the UK aid programme's sustainable tourism research study in Zimbabwe. Dr Russell also has experience of leading a commercial tourism operation (“Ecotourism Safari”) in Central Africa, and advising a South American cruise ship company on environmental management.

Dr Russell recently completed a four-year training project for community-based tourism and conservation practitioners in the small island States of the Pacific. He is currently managing a British Government-funded initiative that includes tourism planning and management in the newly-declared UNESCO Biosphere Reserve of the Cape Horn archipelago in southern Chile. During 2005 Dr Russell also co-organised a UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office-funded seminar on sustainable tourism in Santiago, Chile.

Dr Russell is a Visiting Lecturer in Sustainable Rural Tourism at Birkbeck College, University of London, and at the University of Wales, Aberystwyth. Dr Russell also directs an annual training programme in Environment and Development at the University of Wales, Bangor, which includes a specialist module on responsible tourism.

Dr Anna Spenceley works in southern Africa on sustainable tourism issues, particularly in relation to biodiversity conservation, protected areas, sustainable livelihoods, corporate social responsibility and poverty alleviation. Her consultancy, research and project management experience over the past nine years has included tourism and conservation policy, participatory planning, nature-based tourism business management, environmental and ecological assessment, monitoring, and the socio-cultural and socio-economic assessment of tourism and wildlife impacts. She obtained her doctorate on sustainable nature-based tourism assessment from the International Centre for Responsible Tourism when it was at the University of Greenwich.

Dr Richard Tapper is an expert in the sustainable development of tourism, with extensive experience of consultancy with industry, governments and NGOs and international organisations.

 

Prof. Rhodri Thomas is Institute of Travel and Tourism (ITT) Professor of Tourism and Events Policy and engages in research which seeks to understand and influence public policy and practice against a backdrop of social, cultural and economic change. His particular interests relate to tourism policy formation and change, strategy and evaluation, especially in the context of small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) with their own organisational cultures and dynamics.

Rhodri is an active member of the UK Centre for Events Management based at the University and has also interests in the role of festivals / events and economic development. Rhodri is co-author / editor of five books and sits on the editorial boards of six international journals, including Local Economy, Journal of Small Business and Enterprise Development, and the International Journal of Entrepreneurship and Innovation.

He is Convenor of the ATLAS Tourism SMEs Research Network. Rhodri has acted as ‘specialist expert’ for the European Commission and worked on a variety of projects for, amongst others, the UK government’s Department for Education and Skills (DfES) and Small Business Service (SBS), the Heritage Lottery Fund, the Welsh Development Agency, and People First (the National Sector Skills Council). He is involved directly in strategic tourism and major events policy-making within the region, as Non-Executive Director of Yorkshire Tourist Board.

Dr Matt Walpole is Programme Co-ordinator, Biodiversity and Human Needs at Fauna & Flora International in Cambridge. His PhD thesis (1994-1997) was a model, multidisciplinary study of tourism in Komodo National Park, Indonesia, that contributed to the development of DFID’s stakeholder guidelines for nature-based tourism. Matt completed his PhD as part of the Tourism, Conservation and Sustainable Development research project directed by Harold Goodwin at the Durrell Institute of Conservation and Ecology at the University of Kent. Matt subsequently worked as a project manager and consultant on a range of international projects that seek to integrated conservation and local development through tourism, using a process of research, capacity-building and implementation as a senior research associate based at the University of Kent. Specialising in nature-based tourism as a tool for biodiversity conservation and poverty alleviation, his work over the past decade has focused on a range of tropical developing countries in Africa and Asia.

Caroline is a sustainable and nature-based tourism professional, with a broad range of experience in the public, private and voluntary sectors. She currently runs Wild Scotland, Scotland's nature and wildlife tourism association, and has been instrumental in the development of the wildlife tourism sector in Scotland. Caroline has worked for the Tourism and Environment Forum (TEF) in Scotland which was responsible for the development of the sustainable tourism agenda in Scotland, at policy and business levels, and also has tour operating experience in South America and the UK. Consultancy, teaching and research topics include the economics of whale-watching in Scotland, opportunities for carnivore-watching in Europe and Ethical Tourism in the UK. Clients have included WWF-UK, Tearfund and UK's DEFRA (Dept of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs). She regularly advises on sustainable and wildlife tourism issues in Scotland and her experience includes economic impact studies, partnership building, SME business advice, eco-labels, sustainable tourism policy development, PR & marketing and event management and facilitation.

Dr Simon Woodward is an experienced tourism and heritage industry consultant whose background includes working with one of the ‘Big Four’ accountancy practices, and also spending time as a research scholar at one of Scandinavia’s oldest universities. In 1996 Simon established PLB Consulting Ltd to provide strategic planning, business planning and related services to the cultural and natural heritage sectors.

Simon has an excellent understanding of the environmental impacts of tourism and of community involvement in sustainable leisure and tourism projects. He sits on the ICOMOS UK Cultural Tourism Committee and is a visiting lecturer at Brandenburg Technical University, Germany, as well as an Associate of the International Centre for Responsible Tourism. He has worked throughout the UK and in Southern and East Africa, Scandinavia, Western Europe, South Asia, the USA and the Middle East.