The GDS-Movement is an international change agency dedicated to catalysing socio-economic and environmental transformation in cities and regions. To support this mission, the GDS-Movement offers consultancy services and the GDS-Index, a trusted performance improvement programme to assess and accelerate the progress of a destination’s regenerative journey. With a strong commitment to transparency and impartiality, we ensure that all GDS-Index assessments and advisory processes remain unbiased, empowering destinations to make better-informed, more strategic sustainability decisions. 

The GDS-Index enables destinations to evaluate and accelerate their progress on the regenerative journey. Assessments are conducted over a four-month period. The timeline is available here. During this period, each destination is assigned an independent assessor who performs two rounds of assessments, between which the destination can clarify any queries or supply outstanding info, followed by a rigorous, cross-checked quality control process, and concluded with combined-data evaluations to extract GDS-Index-wide insights and trends. 

In parallel, GDS-Movement provides tailored support to DMOs, guiding them to better define and develop their vision and strategy, build sustainability capacity, engage interested parties, and communicate their sustainability efforts more accurately and effectively. Each year, the GDS-Index methodology and criteria are carefully reviewed in a robust and comprehensive review process including the Technical Advisory Committee, participating destinations past and present, industry experts, and GDS-Movement’s own changemakers. In the process, we gather valuable feedback to help improve the criteria and make it more future fit. 

Through these practices, GDS-Movement upholds a high standard of transparency and impartiality, fostering trust and credibility among destinations on their regenerative journeys and industry peers. The Methodology and criteria are copyrighted, and published each year, further supporting academic discourse*. 

* The GDS-Movement™ and all sub-brands, including the 
GDS-Index, are protected by international copyright law. The GDS-Index criteria can be used for the purposes of benchmarking by tourism and event destinations, and for academic research.
Copyright © 2024 The GDS-Movement™ 

Those who wish to emulate or adapt these approaches for their own sector, industry, or focus, can request permission in writing to info@gds.earth.