Sandals Negril Wins a Cool Environmental Award: EarthCheck

There have been so many stories on my blog (yes, I know!) about the harmful impact of tourist developments on our little island’s fragile environment. So I am happy to see that Sandals Negril has checked a great many sustainability boxes here and has retained this great certification from EarthCheck™ 2017 is the UN Year of Sustainable Tourism – I want to see many more Jamaican hotels stepping up to the plate. Here is the Sandals press release.

Posing with their EarthCheck Award are (from right) General Manager from Sandals Negril, David Latchimy, Environment, Health and Safety Manager, Tavia-Shea Bernard and Hotel Manager, O’Brian Heron.
(Photo: Sandals Negril)

August 12, 2017

SANDALS NEGRIL RETAINS HIGHEST ENVIRONMENTAL ACCOLADE THROUGH EARTHCHECK™

Negril, Westmoreland: Sandals Negril Beach Resort and Spa has once again cemented its place as a world-leading green hotel, by retaining its Double Platinum and EarthCheck™ Master Status Certifications.

Being Master Certified is EarthCheck’s™ highest accolade awarded to organisations demonstrating more than 15 years of commitment to the highest standards of environmental care and social contributions benefiting guests, staff and the local community.

Sandals Negril is the first organisation in the Caribbean to achieve this milestone and shares the remarkable achievement with only four other companies in the world including Sandals Ochi Beach Resort and Spa.

According to Tavia-Shea Bernard, Sandals Negril’s environment, health and safety manager, “This great achievement not only exemplifies exceptional performance, but motivates us to further expand our environmental sustainability strategies.” She continued to boast that since 2003, Sandals Negril has saved 19,668,954 MJ in energy consumption, enough to power 826 typical 4-person households for a year, 94,123,435 litres of potable water which is equivalent to 38 standard Olympic sized swimming pools and 1,038,552 litres of landfilled waste, the equivalent of 31 standard 20-foot shipping containers.

Founded on the sustainable tourism principles of the Rio Earth Summit’s Agenda 21, EarthCheck™ is the world’s leading provider of environmental management, benchmarking and certification systems for the travel and tourism industry.

The programme addresses key global environmental, cultural, social, and economic (ECSE) concerns and deals with environmental regeneration and environmental improvement as well as the conservation of existing natural heritage assets.

Sandals Negril is required to provide leadership, and an integrated and inclusive approach to support sustainable outcomes. The resort is also mandated to measure, monitor and make ongoing improvements in the key performance areas including, greenhouse gas emissions, energy efficiency, conservation and management, management of freshwater resources, ecosystem conservation and management, management of social and cultural issues, land use planning and management, air quality protection and noise control, waste water management, solid waste management and storage of environmentally harmful substances.

Stewart Moore, CEO and founder of EarthCheck, congratulated the Sandals Negril team for their long-term commitment to sustainability, “Sandals Negril now sets the global standard for best practice in sustainability in the travel and tourism industry,” Moore said.

“With this year being the United Nation’s Year of Sustainable Tourism for Development, I am looking forward to witnessing how Sandals Negril will leverage their existing sustainability programme’s and successes in the future to generate further business value, improve business performance and foster innovation,” he stated.