Our Mission
To improve the ecological and economic sustainability of the wildlands and wildlife across South Asia.
Our role
To work as a changemaker with governments, communities and the private sector, to advocate, plan, support and fund the protection, conservation and rewilding of natural wilderness and their wild inhabitants, especially tiger habitat, to realise positive and sustainable outcomes for everyone.
Our approach
- To be a catalyst for change
- To demonstrate what good nature tourism looks like
- To be an enabler in developing new ecotourism models for conservation and rewilding
- To connect with all parties to foster better partnerships and actions
We use the judicious and wise use of nature tourism, using better visitor guidance, more community involvement, targeted green investment and enhanced governance and monitoring.
Our Belief
Within a number of the United Nations Millennium goals, as well as ongoing research from credible conservation agencies including World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and IUCN, is the recognition that well-conceived, well planned and well managed tourism is a critical tool today in wildlife protection and conservation, rural and community development, poverty alleviation and sustainable livelihoods.
To advance the welfare of wild animals threatened with extinction through the loss or degradation of their wild habitats, and to promote the protection, expansion and improvement of those habitats
- By highlighting the ecosystem value of nature and wildlands to humanity, and encouraging enhanced and targeted investment, both public and private, to stimulate protection, conservation and rewilding.
- By catalysing, supporting and helping initiatives that enhance wildlife conservation and community support, including nature conservancies, waste and water management, trade cooperatives, local employment, fair wages and local enterprises and services;
- By advising, planning and training Governments, park authorities, NGO’s and tourism services in the integration of nature tourism with conservation efforts.
- By advocating, planning and supporting better tourism practices in wilderness areas, that cater for all visitors, all ages and a range of interests.
- By providing specific guidelines for wildlife tour operators, service and accommodation providers and visitors, and by the accreditation programme of businesses which follow such guidelines;
- By empowering local communities to become involved in livelihood options through wildlife tourism based projects and by initiating low impact and sustainable development which helps conserve wildlife parks and benefits the communities through employment and business opportunities;
Click here if you are a nature traveller, who has been or is keen to go to see wildlife on the subcontinent.
Click here if you are an International Tour Operator or Travel agent
Click here if you are a Destination Management company or Ground Agent
Click here if you are a Photographic tour operator or Specialist
Click here if you are a wildlife lodge or resort near a wilderness area, an ecofriendly accommodation provider in a natural setting, or are planning to be an accommodation provider within the Indian subcontinent
Click here if you are a South Asia based travel service, representation, or media organisation.
With a number of South Asian’s Government’s stated ambitions to use tourism as a key economic drivers for sustainable development, job creation and poverty alleviation, so TOFTigers has also laid out a road map over the next five years, to ensure its focus and a sustainability format for the nature tourism sector’s growth is applied, particularly in forest or fragile areas like coasts, mountains, deserts and wetlands is laid out across the subcontinent.
- To encourage greater public and private monetary investment in resources and skills alongside legal and novel ways to encourage investment in forest, wildlife and wildlands protection, conservation and rewilding.
- To become a premier voice in advocating well-conceived and well managed responsible nature tourism as a critical and sustainable conservation tool, and to highlight and publicise those providers who commit to the TOFTigers codes of business practice and our accreditation programme.
- To make the our TOFtigers kitemarks internationally recognised symbol of sustainability and credibility amongst both tourism suppliers, International and domestic, as well as a visitor’s ‘buy with confidence’ kitemark to key wilderness destinations across the subcontinent.
- Enhance training and capacity building of related Government authorities and NGO’s to understand and use tourism more effectively, plan for it better and to incorporate the performance indicators of tourism management into a field manager’s performance evaluation.
- To work with, incentivise and encourage all wildlife tourism suppliers, operators and visitors to work to a code of conduct, behavioural code and minimum level accommodation providers’ operational practice when in wilderness or fragile habitats, and to move recent Government regulatory guidelines for sustainable tourism (ISTC) from voluntary standards to mandatory commitments.
- To advocate, plan and support closer cooperation and stakeholder opportunities for local communities and enterprises in the wildlife tourism equation across tiger range states, by and through our travel membership.
- To grow TOFTigers membership both in South Asia and abroad to enhance its role in advocacy, supply chain management and effective, sustainable and proactive changes in wildlife and nature based tourism activities.
- To grow TOFTigers funding base to enhance the objectives, build capacity to cover more ground and have greater influence in nature based and ecotourism policy across South Asia and other tiger range countries.
Nature based travel and tourism itself can place a significant economic value on standing intact forests; as a living breathing ecosystem critical to the long term health and ecological security of the Indian sub-continent and all its inhabitants who live within its reach. This tangible value, set against today’s rapacious development agendas can ensure that wilderness habitat is not undervalued, squandered or turned over in a rush for development in
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TOFTigers’ aim has always to be at the forefront of advocate, guiding and developing this vision and the skills, resources, planning and action needed to achieve it. Click here for further details and research on the subject.
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