Dr. Sakena Yacoobi
Executive Director
Afghan Institute of Learning
Dr. Sakena Yacoobi is Executive Director of the Afghan Institute of Learning (AIL), an Afghan women-led NGO she founded in 1995. Established to provide teacher training, education and health services to women and children, over 7 million have benefited from AIL’s programs to date. Sakena’s vision of a healthier Afghanistan evolved after watching her mother give birth to 15 children, only to have 5 children survive. Under Sakena’s leadership, AIL has established itself as a visionary organization which works at the grassroots level and empowers women and communities to bring education and health services to poor rural and urban girls and women, as well as other disenfranchised Afghans. AIL was the first organization to offer human rights and leadership training to Afghan women in the 1990s. AIL supported 80 underground home schools for 3000 girls in Afghanistan during the Taliban regime. AIL was first to open Women’s Learning Centers for Afghan women—a concept now copied by many organizations throughout Afghanistan. Dr. Yacoobi has received multiple recognition-of-service awards in Afghanistan.
Internationally, her awards include:
- 2004 Women’s Rights Prize of the Peter Gruber Foundation.
- 2006 Senior Ashoka Fellow—first Ashoka Fellow from Afghanistan
- 2006 Skoll Social Entreprenuer
- 2007 Gleitsman International Activist Award
- 2009 UNFPA Board of Advocates Award
- 2009 Henry R. Kravis Award for Leadership
Sakena was among 1,000 women nominated to receive the 2005 Nobel Peace Prize. Sakena has received honorary doctorates from the University of the Pacific and Loma Linda University for her work in human rights and for her distinguished contribution to society. Dr. Yacoobi is on the boards of Global Fund for Women and Creating Hope International and is an advisor to Women’s Learning Partnership and the Peter and Patricia Gruber Foundation.
Jim Mather MSP
Minister for Enterprise, Energy, and Tourism, Scotland
Born in March 1947, Jim Mather MSP was educated at Paisley Grammar, Greenock High School and Glasgow University, where he studied accountancy, law and economics.
In 1964, he became an apprentice chartered accountant, going on on to work in the computer industry, latterly running his own business, before entering politics.
From 2000 until 2004, he was the party’s National Treasurer. At the 2003 Scottish Parliament election, Jim was elected as a Highlands and Islands MSP. As Shadow Enterprise and Economy Minister, he was a member of the SNP’s Shadow Cabinet.
Mr Mather became the MSP for Argyll and Bute at the 2007 Scottish Parliament election and was appointed Minister for Enterprise, Energy and Tourism.
He has been involved in the development and promotion of the Economic Case for Independence and is a Director of Business for Scotland.
He is married with two children.
Keith Bellows
Editor-in-Chief
National Geographic Traveler
Born in the Democratic Republic of Congo and a Canadian citizen, Keith Bellows, 58, was named editor-in-chief of NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC TRAVELER magazine in January 1998 and a vice president of the National Geographic Society in March 2000. Under his stewardship, the magazine has been nominated for two National Magazine Awards, won more than 60 Lowell Thomas Awards for best travel writing (it has been named best magazine eight of his 11 years and this year won as best magazine and best website), and eight Folio Awards for Best Travel Magazine. As a tip of the hat to new media, TRAVELER has won an iTunes People’s Choice Award for Best Podcast of 2006, for which Bellows wrote two scripts. Its “Intelligent Travel” won a 2007 Travvie and a 2009 Lonely Planet Award as best travel blog.
In addition to editing TRAVELER, Bellows developed a major spinoff of the magazine’s website built around the award-winning special issue 50 Places of a Lifetime. He also writes “One on One,” a regular interview column with compelling figures—Al Gore, hotelier Ian Schrager, Steve Case, Dolly Parton, futurist Andrew Zolli, Island Records founder Chris Blackwell—who have something important to say about how we travel and where we go. He helped position TRAVELER as a leader in sustainable travel and has made it the travel photography magazine (it runs the world’s biggest travel-photo contest, the only travel cell-phone contest, and a series of city-based photo seminars regarded as the best in the business). He also helped create journeystreams, an innovative open-source web program to help students tell stories.
Prior to joining National Geographic, Mr. Bellows was developing internet content as early as 1994. He worked for Rupert Murdoch’s Delphi web service; as creative director launched BabyCenter.com (now owned by Johnson & Johnson); was the executive producer of Excite.com; and was founding partner of WestWorld Media, which developed Metallica’s first website and created the college-based Campus Voice.com.
He has written for Esquire, Sports Illustrated, Parenting, AARP, and many other magazines. He also wrote The Canuck Book and the 1998 Winter Olympics ACCESS Guide for ABC-TV. He is now writing 100 Places That Will Change Your Child’s Life, part of a program he is developing to encourage parents, corporations, and schools to view travel as a critical learning tool. It will be published in October 2011.
Nicky Fitzgerald
Luxury Adventure Travel Industry Veteran
Nicky Fitzgerald opened her first hotel in 1982 at the southernmost tip of Africa and since then has opened, operated and marketed over 60 luxury safari lodges and boutique hotels across South Africa, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Tanzania, Kenya and India.
In 1994 she was employed by Conservation Corporation Africa (CC Africa) as Operations Director and moved across to Sales and Marketing in 2001. Nicky was part of the team that grew CC Africa from 3 to 50 lodges across sub Saharan Africa, and later in India, in all the great wilderness high spots – Masai Mara, Ngorongoro Crater, Serengeti, Okavango Delta, Victoria Falls, Namib Desert, Kruger National Park, Kahna and Bandhavgarh National Parks, to name but a few. The company employed 2800 people and also ran successful tour operations business in 15 African countries. Many CC Africa lodges are award winning (Ngorongoro Crater Lodge was voted 2nd best hotel in the world by UK Conde Nast Traveller magazine in 2005) and the company has been honored with multiple prestigious ecotourism awards – including global winner of British Airways Tourism for Tomorrow Award. In 2008 she was responsible for the rebranding of CC Africa to &Beyond and repositioned &Beyond’s travel business from being a tour operator to becoming a luxury travel provider specialising in fulfilling high ticket trips off the website.
Nicky departed from &Beyond in October after 15 years with the company and is currently exploring the many opportunities that the luxury travel industry offers especially in Latin America. Together with her husband Steve she is a founding partner of Pangaea Associates, a consultancy focusing on the development of ecotourism in the developing world.
John Kasaona
Assistant Director
Integrated Rural Development and Nature Conservation (IRDNC)
John Kasaona is a pioneer of community-based conservation — working with the people who use and live on fragile land to enlist them in protecting it. He is a leader in the drive to reinvent conservation in Namibia — turning poachers into protectors of species. It’s a standard nature-documentary scenario: a pristine animal habitat under constant threat by the people who live there, hunting, camping, setting fires. But John Kasaona knows there is a better way to see this relationship between people and environment. As the assistant director for the Integrated Rural Development and Nature Conservation (IRDNC) , Kasaona works on ways to improve the lives of rural people in Namibia by involving them in the management of the lands they live on — and the species that live there with them.
Kasanoa’s Community-Based Natural Resource Management (CBNRM) program helps rural villages set up communal conservancies, which manage and use local natural resources in a sustainable manner. Essentially, it’s about restoring the balance of land and people to that of pre-colonial times, and allowing the people with the most interest in the survival of their environment to have control of it. His work was featured in the recent film Milking the Rhino.
Michaela S. Guzy
Vice President/Travel and Business Development, Travel + Leisure
Michaela S. Guzy is the Vice President responsible for overseeing the travel category and development of new business initiatives for the Travel + Leisure brand. With six global editions in twenty-four countries, one of the fastest growing travel content websites, and three Travel+Leisure retail outlets–Travel + Leisure is one of the most recognized travel brands in the world. In her role, Guzy oversees the brand’s business operations, including sales, new program development, and industry relations.
Over the course of her career, she has established herself as a leader in the publishing and travel industries. Guzy joined Travel + Leisure in April 2007 as Advertising Director, Travel + International. Most recently she served as the Travel & Consumer Electronics Director for Town & Country, Town & Country Travel and Town & Country Weddings, and in Condé Nast Corporate Sales. Guzy began her career in media planning at Deutsch Inc. In addition to speaking at the Adventure Travel Trade Association’s summit in Scotland, Guzy will also speak at the VisitBritain International Business Exchange and at the ABETA Summit in Sao Paulo, Brazil.
In her free time, Guzy volunteers and helps to raise funds for the New York Center for Children. She graduated from Spring Hill College with a degree in Communication Arts/Advertising and a minor in Studio Art/Graphic Design, and resides in New York City.
Travel+Leisure is published by American Express Publishing Corporation
Neil Fiske
President & CEO Eddie Bauer LLC
Mr. Fiske has served as President and CEO of Eddie Bauer LLC since June of 2007. During his tenure he has led the effort to bring the company back to its roots and reclaim its place as an American icon.
This includes the launch of First Ascent in 2009, “the most significant line of outerwear in a generation”, built by some of the world’s best known mountain guides. First Ascent’s final testing ground was Mt. Everest in May 2009. And, as part of this, Eddie Bauer produced near real-time daily video coverage of its Return to Everest Expedition – a first in Everest’s history. Mr. Fiske has also pulled the company’s rich heritage forward bringing the quality, value, and style of its product back to the standards set by the company’s founder, Eddie Bauer, in 1920.
Mr. Fiske has over 20 years’ experience in retail and related industries. Before his role at Eddie Bauer, Mr. Fiske was chief executive officer of the Bath and Body Works, a division of Limited Brands. Prior to Limited Brands, Mr. Fiske spent fourteen years at Boston Consulting Group focused on the Consumer Goods and Retail sector.
Mr. Fiske is the author of “Trading Up: The New American Luxury,” a Business Week bestseller and winner of the American Marketing Association’s Newberry award for best marketing book. He was also recognized as “Marketer of the Year” and “Retailer of the Year” in 2004 and 2005 by Women’s Wear Daily.
Mr. Fiske is a graduate of Harvard Business School and Williams College. He is an avid skier, climber, and outdoorsman.
Ellen Bettridge
Vice President
American Express –
U.S. Retail Travel Network
Ellen Bettridge is American Express’s vice president of the U.S. Retail Travel Network, responsible for the management and growth of the company-owned U.S. travel service offices; as well as sales, account management, card integration and product development initiatives for the U.S. Representative Network Travel team. A role she has had since 2002. Through her leadership, Bettridge has grown the Representative Travel Network sales 100% by attracting some of the largest industry agencies to the franchise that compliment American Expresses expansive products and services. Prior to this role, Bettridge held various management positions within American Express including, director account development executive, field performance manager for the eastern region in Corporate Services
Bettridge takes an active role within the travel industry and is currently serving as ASTA’s Corporate Advisory council Chairman, and she sits on the advisory boards of Travel + Leisure, Rosewood Hotels and Travcorp.
John Sterling
Executive Director
The Conservation Alliance
John Sterling has spent the past 17 years in the conservation field, and has been involved with The Conservation Alliance since 1996. The Conservation Alliance is a group of 170 outdoor industry companies that work together to protect threatened wild places throughout North America. John was Director of Environmental Programs at Patagonia, Inc. until 2002, and represented the company on the Alliance board.
He left Patagonia to launch a career to help businesses engage in meaningful conservation work. John was hired as Executive Director in 2005, and has helped The Conservation Alliance build its membership and profile within the outdoor industry. Prior to his time at Patagonia, John was a staffer at Earth Island Institute. He serves on the boards of the Oregon Natural Desert Association, based in Bend, Oregon. John is an avid climber, telemark skier, and backpacker, and an aspiring birder. He can be found most mornings walking along the Deschutes River with his daughter, Lily and son, Ian.
Judith Fein
Journalist & Author
Judith Fein, author of the much-acclaimed new book, LIFE IS A TRIP, is an award-winning international travel journalist who lives to leave. She resided for more than ten years in Europe and North Africa and has a passion for adventures that are exotic, authentic, quirky, historic and immersed in local culture.
She has written travel articles for more than 90 magazines, newspapers and internet sites, including The L.A. Times, National Geographic Traveler, The Boston Globe, Sierra, the Utne Reader, Hemispheres (United Airlines), Travel Age West Magazine (for travel agents), Robb Report, Art and Antiques, Intermezzo, Continental, The Denver Post, New Mexico Magazine, The Dallas Morning News, Executive Traveler, Dreamscapes, TravelandLeisure.com, Just For Canadian Doctors, Hadassah Magazine, Wine Enthusiast, Organic Spa, Native Peoples, Islands, MSN/UK, AAA Traveler, The Christian Science Monitor, ConsumerTraveler.com. She has appeared on the Today show and countless local and region TV and radio shows. Judith was a regular reporter for “The Savvy Traveler” on national public radio for 6 years, is travel editor of Spirituality and Health magazine and the San Diego Jewish Journal and Contributing Writer for Organic Spa magazine.
She is the editor and co-founder of the popular website www.YourLifeisaTrip.com which now has over 70 writers. She has been an acclaimed speaker for many venues like the Educational Travel Conference, Women in Communication, Northern New Mexico Press Women’s Association, A Taste of Honey (Albuquerque), the Hospice Organization, the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, the Archives of the State of New Mexico.
She is the Vice President of the Travel Journalist Guild. With her photojournalist husband Paul Ross, she produces travel videos, slideshows and does travel performances. The duo teach travel writing and photography around the globe.
Dr. Wallace “J” Nichols
Co-founder, Ocean Revolution & Research Associate, California Academy of Sciences
Dr. Nichols has been a leading ocean conservationist for 15 years. Focusing on sea turtles, he has published numerous studies on sea turtle biology and conservation and led the first team to track a marine animal crossing an ocean (a loggerhead tracked 12,000 km from Baja California Sur, Mexico to Japan) in 1996-7.
His latest research with Hoyt Peckham has shown the Baja California Peninsula to have the world’s highest sea turtle bycatch rate. He is a Research Associate at the California Academy of Sciences, former President of the International Sea Turtle Society, and Eastern Pacific co-chair for the IUCN’s Marine Turtle Specialists Group. Dr. Nichols was a Fulbright Fellow, a Bradley Fellow at Duke University, and is a member of numerous advisory boards including Oceana, Sea Turtle Restoration Project, and Save Our Shores. He co-founded SEE Turtles in 2007 as a way to promote wildlife conservation through travel.
Costas Christ
Chairman, World Travel and Tourism Council – Tourism for Tomorrow Awards
Costas Christ is an internationally recognized sustainable tourism expert whose work and travels have taken him to more than 100 countries across six continents, including expeditions to some of the world’s most remote wilderness areas and archaeological sites.
Costas is the Editor At Large for National Geographic Traveler and the former Global Travel Editor for National Geographic Adventure. He also writes the Go Green Travel Column for Virtuoso Life, in addition to serving as Virtuoso’s Director for Sustainability.
His professional career in travel spans more than three decades and he is a frequent keynote speaker at international travel conferences and events, including three National Geographic Adventure-sponsored speaking tours from 2007 – 2009. He serves as Chairman of the World Travel and Tourism Council – Tourism for Tomorrow Awards which recognize global leadership in sustainable practices and is a special advisor to World Travel Market Responsible Tourism Day. He has appeared many times on television and radio, including Travel Channel, Today Show, Good Morning America, CNN, BBC, and National Public Radio, among others and is widely regarded as one of the pioneers of ecotourism. Costas’ travel articles and essays have also appeared in many leading publications, including the New York Times, International Herald Tribune and Sunday Times of London. He was a founding member and former Chairman of The International Ecotourism Society. As Senior Director at Conservation International, Costas supervised ecotourism projects in eighteen countries, working with the travel industry and local communities to support the protection of biodiversity and support cultural and natural heritage preservation. He is an adviser to various travel foundations, including serving as Ambassador-at-Large for the Spirit of Big Five Foundation, as an executive board member of The Bodhi Tree Foundation, and as a senior adviser to The Leading Travel Companies Conservation Foundation. In 2008, Costas was recognized as a ‘Travel Visionary’ by the International Restaurant and Hotel Awards.
Dr Mike Cantlay
Chairman, VisitScotland
Dr Cantlay is Chairman and Managing Director of William Glen Limited which operates tourism, leisure and retail interests in Scotland, Canada and the USA. He was previously Chair and Managing Director of highland dress specialist Hector Russell and also tourist retail chain The Whisky Shop. Dr Cantlay was brought up in Callander where he still lives and his business is headquartered. He has held several public appointments including Deputy Chair of VisitScotland; Chair of Scottish Enterprise Forth Valley; Chair of the Board of Management at Forth Valley College and an advisory member of the board of Scottish Enterprise. He is also serving a second term as Convenor of Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park Authority; an appointment he will complete later in 2010; and is a Non Executive Director the board of Highlands and Islands Airports Ltd (HIAL), a position which he will continue to undertake..
Dr Cantlay has had links with tourism throughout his career and brings extensive knowledge and experience of tourism at home and abroad, as well as a track record of serving Scotland’s global Diaspora. He was awarded the Scottish Thistle Tourism Award for Young Manager of the Year in 1992, has held numerous positions with local tourist associations, has been Director of several retail businesses with tourism links – both in Scotland and North America, and was a Board Member of the Scottish Tourist Board and VisitScotland from 1998 to 2005 (including Deputy Chairman from 2001 to 2005).
Masters of Ceremonies:
Praveen Moman
Co-founder and Managing Director, Volcanoes Safaris
Praveen Moman had the good fortune to be born in Uganda, at the heart of the African continent, in an extended family that was part of the pioneering and adventuring Asian community that was the forefront of opening up East and Central Africa in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. He grew up on safari under the big African sky before the winds of change brought his family to Britain when he was a teenager. After a career as a political and policy adviser in the British Government and the European Union, he returned to his African roots by co-founding Volcanoes Safaris in 1997 with Yusuf Mulima Mubiru.
Under his guiding vision, Volcanoes Safaris has been at the forefront of reviving tourism in Uganda and Rwanda, after the conflict in the region had settled down. Today the company is recognized for the unique great ape eco-tourism model it has created, centred around the threatened gorilla and chimpanzee populations of the western rift valley. Praveen has led the Volcanoes team that created the company’s eco-lodges near the great ape parks. The eco-lodges are sensitive to the post-conflict context, the culture of local communities and the need to use resources in a sustainable way and have empowered local people to manage them. Volcanoes Safaris is the only safari company to be a signatory to the UN Kinshasa Declaration on Saving the Great Apes.
Educated at London and Cambridge University in the UK, Praveen is a trustee of Seva Mandir UK, a respected Indian charity working with rural communities in Rajasthan, India and is a former VSO volunteer in Jamaica and a Robert Schuman Scholar. He is on the Advisory Board of the Association of Adventure Travel Trade Association in the USA and Pure Life Experiences and the Bodhi Tree Foundation.
Mei Zhang
Founder, WildChina
Mei Zhang is Founder of WildChina, a premium sustainable travel company offering distinctive, ecologically sensitive journeys to all corners of China. A native of Yunnan province in southwest China, Mei earned her MBA from Harvard Business School (HBS) and worked as a management consultant for McKinsey & Company until she found her true passion in sustainable travel.
Mei left a management consulting career to start WildChina in 2000, inspired by the clash she perceived between economic development and conservation of both nature and culture in Yunnan. She strongly believed that there was a for-profit solution to this: providing sophisticated interpretation of Chinese culture and nature, and therefore creating an experiential travel that was unheard of in China. She built WildChina on the mission to assist travelers to experience China differently.
From the start, WildChina involved local stakeholders to develop grassroots eco-tourism programs, such as helping a local village lodge owner turn his property into an eco-lodge that caters to international guests, from assisting with menu development to improvements on lodging and bedding. WildChina also pioneered environmentally friendly backpacking journeys, a first in China. By using solar power, minimizing waste and hiring and training local crews to set up tents and prepare gourmet meals, WildChina ensures that clients travel in style without damaging the environment.
Together with the current CEO Albert Ng, Mei has transformed WildChina, with offices in Beijing, Hong Kong and the United States, into an award-winning business: National Geographic Adventure – “Best Adventure Travel Company on Earth;” National Geographic Traveler – “Tours of a Lifetime;” Travel & Leisure – “A list Agent for China.” The WildChina story has been covered by CNN, Wall Street Journal, New York Times, TIME and more.
Realizing that WildChina alone cannot change the industry, Mei makes time to speak at various forums and conferences about eco-tourism and sustainable tourism in China. She returns to Harvard each spring to present the case study that HBS wrote on WildChina, teaching MBA students that one can be a successful entrepreneur in the sustainable travel business.
