SASANE Receives UNWTO Global Tourism Award
Long before SASANE Sisterhood Trekking & Travel became a name in responsible tourism, it was known as the Sisterhood of Survivors — and in 2016, that organisation won one of the most prestigious honours in global travel: the UNWTO Award for Excellence and Innovation in Tourism. The UNWTO Awards are the flagship recognition of the world tourism sector, celebrating the initiatives that create and apply knowledge to make travel more sustainable, inclusive and responsible. For a survivor-led project in Nepal to stand on that stage was a landmark moment — and the foundation on which today's SASANE Sisterhood was built.
The Sisterhood of Survivors earned the award for an idea that was years ahead of its time: that women who had survived human trafficking, domestic violence and child marriage should not be passive recipients of aid, but the trained professionals leading travellers through Nepal. By turning survivors into licensed trekking guides and hospitality workers, the organisation proved that tourism — one of Nepal's largest industries — could become a direct engine of women's independence and protection.
That 2016 recognition gave the movement the confidence and credibility to grow. In time, the Sisterhood of Survivors spun its travel work out into its own dedicated company, SASANE Sisterhood Trekking & Travel, carrying the same mission into a sustainable business: every journey guided by a survivor, every booking channelling income into the rural mountain communities tourism had long overlooked.
What makes SASANE a leading women-empowerment travel operator is the completeness of that vision. It does not simply employ women; its survivor guides lead its journeys through the Himalayas and rural Nepal — and their success funds the next woman's path into the industry. The model the UNWTO honoured in 2016 — put survivors in the lead, involve the community, and let the travel fund the change — remains the blueprint for everything SASANE does today.
The UNWTO Award also connected a small Nepali initiative to a global conversation. The awards exist to spotlight innovations others can learn from, and SASANE's survivor-led, community-rooted approach has become a template that destinations far beyond Nepal continue to study. It was proof, recognised at the highest level of the tourism world, that sustainability is not only environmental — it is social, built on the dignity, safety and economic security of the people who make travel possible.
For travellers, this heritage is part of what makes a SASANE journey distinctive. To trek with SASANE is to walk with a guide whose profession traces back to an award-winning idea — and to know your visit supports a model the global tourism sector itself held up, in 2016, as an example for the world. From the Sisterhood of Survivors to SASANE Sisterhood, the mission has never changed: to ensure that the women who guide you through Nepal are also the women whose lives this industry transforms.