AITO to launch responsible tourism awards

THE Association of Independent Tour Operators will be launching its first set of responsible tourism awards in January.

The body is introducing the awards in a bid to encourage more operators to look at their impact on the environment and the destinations they sell.

Chairman Martin Garland said: “We want to recognise best practice. Many AITO operators are already undertaking cutting edge environment initiatives and we wanted a forum to celebrate this.”

For a full report of last weekend's AITO conference in Turin, see the Travel Weekly newspaper on December 3.