World Leisure International Innovation Prize

Trekking Routes in Nepal: Path for a Sustainable Development Model

Garima Voyage Travels & Tours is composed by young, creative and committed professionals in various fields, with the goal to give benefit to two communities:

• To the hosting community: income generating activities related to tourism, enhance their capacity, promote and protect environment and territories, support their culture and create opportunities especially to marginalized groups by promoting development in rural and mountain areas of Nepal at risk of abandonment, by sustainable use of resources
• To the hosted community: offer an experience of living styles and creating friendship among countries

GARIMA VOYAGE TRAVELS AND TOURS was founded in 2017. GARIMA in Nepali means Dignity. In this sense, they are not only a ‘travel agency’, they are a social organization that promotes sustainable business opportunities to local communities and territories.

Good Boost is a social enterprise delivering technology to support older adults and people with musculoskeletal (MSK) conditions, like arthritis and back pain, take part in inclusive and accessible exercise sessions. We achieve this at local leisure centres, swimming pools and at home; supporting beneficiaries to be more active and manage their health condition through exercise. We achieve this through our pioneering and world-leading technology of A.I. personalised aqua exercise and rehabilitation software, delivered in partnership with community leisure centres and arthritis charities to transform any space into a therapeutic exercise place.

For more information visit: https://www.goodboost.ai/

InstructAbility is the only project in the UK and worldwide that is focused on enabling disabled people to become part of the leisure and fitness sector workforce. InstructAbility was set up in 2011 to enable more disabled people to access training and employment opportunities and reduce the physical and attitudinal barriers they face and in turn make facilities more welcoming to disabled customers.

To maximize the learning from the program and reach as many people as possible, Aspire is producing a set of evidence-based guidelines for the whole sector, due to be published in 2019. These will support the increase in the number of disabled people, training providers and employers in the workforce. The guidelines are based on innovative academic research and will be of value to the global leisure sector.

Awamaki is a non-profit social enterprise which creates lasting impact in the Andes mountains of Peru by empowering rural women’s cooperatives to launch successful small businesses, creating authentic, high-quality products and experiences. Since 2009, Awamaki invests in women’s skills, connects them to market access and supports their leadership so they can increase their income and transform their communities.

Three cooperatives have already participated in the organization’s sustainable tourism program in which they learn the administrative procedures and cultural expectations of hosting international visitors. The program involves working directly with indigenous artisans in order to create mutually respectful and transparent tourism experiences. Graduate cooperatives are equipped to partner with other tourism providers, such as agencies or guides, to offer sustainable tourism experiences.

Health Matters is a Centers for Disease Control (CDC) funded project designed to strengthen community partnerships, enhance healthy food access, and provide leisure opportunities to increase physical activity in four of North Carolina’s most under-resourced, rural counties with obesity rates greater than 40%. Health Matters works through Cooperative Extension with these communities to build on their existing strengths, with leisure service interventions playing a critical role.

The project was recognized nationally due to their successful community engagement, sustainability of the project and innovative and practical evaluation methods. Moreover, the Health Matters program has enabled to continue connecting low-income families with access to healthy food and physical activity amenities in everyday leisure settings, such as schools, out-of-school programs, faith communities, and Parks and Recreation facilities.

StreetVelodrome is a UK national initiative, taking the form of pop-up, portable cycling velodrome, which started in 2014 by the cycling enthusiast Carl Thompson, to encourage more people to be active via cycle sport. It is as a result of this motivation that the idea of making this practice more accessible – by creating transportable cycling banks that can locate almost anywhere – arose. To give it purpose, a unique StreetVelodrome sport was created, as part of an exciting ‘event’ which people would want to engage with.

StreetVelodrome is engaged by local authorities (councils) in all parts of the UK and Ireland. A series of competitive races take place at the velodrome, featuring top professional riders as well as amateurs and children. Some events are city-based and many others take place in suburban and semi-rural locations. Since their purpose is specifically to engage with as many and as diverse a range of people as possible, community involvement is key to what StreetVelodrome terms “access events”.

The Yongan River Green Route is situated in a small mountainous county 200 kilometres from the capital city, Hangzhou. The green route is 112 Kilometres long and stretches along the Yongan River. The Green Route connects the county town of Xianju with five other rural towns, and 87 villages.

Compared with the many traditional green routes in other cities, it is innovative because not only is it extensive with its benefits covering many communities but it also has multiple roles. It covers the functions of transport, ecological preservation, leisure, scientific research, and linking urban and rural areas. It also provides more than 500 direct jobs and more than 1,000 indirect jobs to the nearby villages. In 2015, China’s Ministry of Construction conferred the award of “the Model for Chinese Living Environment”. In 2016, it received more than 1 million tourists and the number is expected to grow in the future.

The programme is managed by The People’s Government of Keqiao District, Shaoxing, China.

Keqiao District of Shaoxing, renowned as a millennium city and Oriental Venice, is in the south of the Yangtze River Delta. To improve the quality of life of residents, Keqiao District has focused on developing as a diversified, high-grade, and large-scale leisure sports destination. It has formed several leisure sports zones, which include many diverse projects. It is unique in China.

Keqiao District possesses 3 leisure sports zones, (1) Textile City Sports Centre in the north, (2) Cool Play Town in the middle, and (3) Mountainous-Outdoor Sports Section in the south.

The Textile City Sports Centre consists of a stadium, a training field, a gymnasium, and a swimming pool. It is a well-equipped and highly-occupied sports complex. The Cool Play Town is composed of Qiaobo Ice and Snow World, Zhejiang Circuit, Jian Lake Golf Club, Oriental Neverland, Ruohang Heliport and Yiteng Football Club. The Mountainous-Outdoor Sports Section owns 100+ km ancient courses, bicycle trail systems and Millennium Torreya Grandis Trees, and provides leisure programs of cross-forest racing, cycling, camping, drifting, and staying in local homes. Its varied leisure sports projects accommodated over 18 million visitors in 2016, including 261,300 international visitors. These diversified leisure sports have improved the health of residents. Statistically, the average life span in 2016 was 82.1 years, 5.36 years higher than that of whole China.

Keqiao District now becomes a demonstration model of leisure sports development in China, and attracts many visitors from governments, colleges, enterprises, and research institutions each year.

The programme is managed by Hangzhou Municipal Government, China.

Qiaoxi Historical District is situated on the west side of the historical Gongchen bridge at the southern end of China’s Grand Canal, a UNESCO World Heritage site. It covers 7.29 hectares that were redeveloped from 2007 to 2010. The project demonstrates its innovation through heritage preservation, recreation programming and the provision of learning opportunities.

Before the project, it was a slum, full of bankrupt or empty factories, laid off or retried workers, old houses and badly-maintained public facilities. Following a government-initiated redevelopment project, it is now a liveable community for 292 original households who moved into renovated apartments or townhouses.

It is a popular destination for recreation and heritage appreciation providing free access to five national museums (i.e., The China Knives, Scissors and Swords Museum, China Umbrella Museum, China Fan Museum, the Arts and Crafts Museum, and the Workmanship Demonstration Pavilion). These museums are housed in abandoned factories and warehouses. They display and perpetuate the host city’s arts and crafts. This district also possesses three traditional Chinese medical stores, creative arts and book stores, as well as restaurants and cafes.

Distinctive from many other leisure sites worldwide, Qiaoxi district is well-known for its learning opportunities. Visitors can participate in embroidery, pottery, silk and paper umbrella making, leather carving, paper cutting, stone and wood carving, carpentry and other DIY activities supervised by experienced craftspeople.

In April 2016, El Sistema’s artistic director Ron Davis Alvarez started his dream orchestra, El Sistema Sweden Dream Orchestra, with a handful of young boys from a refugee home south of Gothenburg.

A year later, the orchestra consists of more than 40 children and young people, most of them alone from Afghanistan, Syria, Iran, Eritrea and Albania. Three times a week they practice in central Gothenburg your many of them travel a long way to get involved. Dream Orchestra is growing steadily in line with the availability of instruments with the aim of forming a full symphony orchestra.

Today the Dream Orchestra is an orchestra with 53 members which offers a tool for learning for life and for social change.

The Canadian recreation training Programme Diplôme d’Aptitude aux Fonctions d’Animateur (DAFA) or Group Facilitation Skills Certificate..

The Programme was established in 2009 by seven recreation organisations and is now recognised by all of Quebec’s recreation organisations. The programme is managed by the Quebec Leisure Council/ Conseil québécois du loisir.

Over 22,000 young people have already registered, and nearly 400 municipalities and local organisations work with 800 instructors to deliver DAFA courses.

The training standard is operational in every region of the Quebec province as a way of ensuring quality and safety in group activities.

The DAFA Programme is the result of an unprecedented cooperative effort on the part of Quebec’s recreation organisations, working together to manage the Programme’s development.

The DAFA Programme meets expected standards for quality and safety in the facilitation of group recreation, validates the work of the facilitators, promotes recruitment and retention, and encourages discussion between networks through recognition of the Programme across Quebec and beyond.

Thanks to its decentralised structure and the flexibility, it provides to organisations, training can be adapted to any community’s needs. It was chosen by TIESS as one of a number of innovative experiences that connect municipalities and the social economy.

For the past ten years, the Peace Village Hostel has specialised in welcoming young people from across the world. Visitors enjoy a personal and tailored visit to the former World War One frontline from the hostel. In 2015, some 20.000 youngsters from the UK, Ireland, Belgium, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Australia, Canada and New Zealand stayed at the Peace Village.

The Peace Village Hostel provides more than just a bed and board, the educational department focusses on the former battlefields of the Great War. The landscape, the final eye witness of the conflict, is still scattered with relics of the distant past. Hundreds of cemeteries have become the final resting place for soldiers from both sides with monuments, mine craters and memorials which remind us of the horror of the Great War. The Peace Village wants to assist (young) visitors in their discovery of the local area and in an interactive way transfer that experience into a lesson for life which resonates today.