GSTC - Global Sustainable Tourism Council

STC Certification 

The GSTC (Global Sustainable Tourism Council) is a non-governmental organization established in 2007 with the support of UNEP – United Nations Environment Programme – and UNWTO – United Nations World Tourism Organization – to promote sustainability and social responsibility in the tourism sector.

GSTC is the global standard or norm for sustainable tourism and is comparable to other frameworks like MSC or FSC. In addition, GSTC Certification is a third party audit of a tourism business or destination to the GSTC standard.

Control Union is a GSTC accredited Certification Body. GSTC Accreditation plays an important role to assure impartiality, quality, competence and credibility of the process and the certification itself.

GSTC Certification can help tourism businesses to redefine the way they do business, for the benefit of both people and planet. This sustainability journey presents invaluable opportunities for tourism businesses and destinations for improvements, reflections, endowing credibility and connecting with host communities.

Our offer

• Control Union Certifications (CUC) offers a global one-stop-shop for GSTC certification and a wide range of certification programmes.
• CUC is an Accredited Certification Body for the Global Sustainable Tourism Council (GSTC) Industry standards. This means we have been awarded certification according to processes that comply with the highest international standards and good practices.
• CUC can offer GSTC certification for both individual tourism enterprises as well as for groups of e.g. hotels or tour operators (group certification).

GSTC Accredited Certification programs:

• GSTC for hotels download criteria
• GSTC for tour operators download criteria
• GSTC for attractions & excursions (in the course of 2023)
• Türkiye’s Sustainable Tourism Certification Program

Control Union Certifications BV is accredited by ASI for this scheme under registration nr. ASI-ACC-017.