1. Best Practices in sustainable
tourism management
what should donor funded projects achieve
Dr Xavier Font
Leeds Metropolitan University

2. In your experience, what are the
reasons why projects fail/succeed?
Failure Success
•unprofessional project •leadership,
management, •professional and skilled
•failure to recognise the local staff,
situation, •sustainability of project,
•lack of leadership, •a well-defined project,
•unprofessional or unskilled •and collaboration and
staff, communication between
•lack of collaboration and stakeholders
communication between
stakeholders

3. The most desirable projects…
1. Have focused and realistic objectives, given the
limitations of time and resources
2. Build local capacity and ensure knowledge
transfer
3. Are clear about objectives and targets
4. Have a clear market, tourists or tourism
businesses, for the goods or services
5. Have credible evidence that the project will be
sustainable and not donor dependent

4. Projects are least likely to…
1. Monitor and report publicly all positive/negative
impacts
2. Have a mechanism to ensure that the
development of supply does not outstrip demand
3. Only finance replicable projects with clear
transferability
4. Engage local people in the project approval
process
5. Get real support from political leaders

5. The business of donor funding
1. Reasons for funding not feasibility or impact. No needs
analysis.
2. Donors unwilling to admit failure and would prefer continue
funding unfeasible but politically appealing projects
3. Donors care more about spending the budget & form filling
than making a difference
4. We propose unrealistic projects to get the funding
5. Nobody asks the beneficiaries. It was free, so anything is
better than nothing
6. Short term results focus- capacity building is not an option
7. No evaluation of project sustainability beyond funded period
8. Donors do not want to evaluate because it would show “the
emperor’s cloak”