Green Rural Enterprises: guidelines for empowering local groups towards sustainable ventures.

In developing countries rural communities frequently face conditions of economic poverty, yet these areas are often rich in natural resources and biodiversity. We propose the concept of Green Rural Enterprise (GRE) and a methodology for its assessment by scoring 38 indicators based upon: (1) wise use of natural resources, (2) territorial rural development, (3) local rural groups and (4) sustainability-driven enterprise. Three cases of the auto-evaluation of community-based ecotourism groups are presented, where self-assessment is emphasised as an empowering tool. This method is useful for NGOs and funding agencies to compare and evaluate conservation ventures and to facilitate joint-work between them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]