NSITEN
New & Returning Members Application Process
INDIGENOUS BUSINESSES
(Free Membership for 2023-2024-2025)
Categories:
1. Indigenous Owned Tourism Businesses
(Entrepreneurs) – Voting Members
2. Indigenous Community Owned Tourism
(Band Enterprises) – Voting Members
3. Indigenous Artists, Crafters, Cultural
Performers, Elders, Students & SME’s
(If you are not registered as a business owner,
then you will be registered Non-Voting Members)
ALL INDIGENOUS BUSINESSES PLEASE REGISTER USING THIS
RED LINK BELOW:
https://forms.gle/PZ4PLkkV9W7rUQRp8
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Non-Indigenous Non-Voting Membership
4. Indigenous Tourism Allies & Partners
(Industry/Gov’t/Education Institutions
Not for Profit Org’s/Others)
(Non-Voting Members)
ALL NON-INDIGENOUS PLEASE REGISTER
We value your contribution and participation as part of the ongoing cultural tourism community and business development work that our organization has been doing since 2017.
We know we need more input from majority owned Indigenous business owners, whether they are individual entrepreneur owned businesses or community owned businesses, we know the capacity has to continue growing and your voices around our tables need to be there.
We know we also need the supportive voices from our Industry and Government partners and the many allies we have that come from the non-government organizations and educational institutions as well as the community and volunteer organizations.
Building a strong future for Indigenous cultural tourism in Nova Scotia will require all of us to work together for a stronger, more inclusive future for Indigenous people in the mainstream tourism industry.
VOTING & NON-VOTING INFORMATION
As we are a not-for-profit organization focused on supporting the growth of Indigenous businesses in the tourism sector, our focus is to grow this voice that has been missing in the tourism industry.
Part of the goal of this organization is to help build and grow new and existing Indigenous businesses. Through the development of any new organization there are by-laws that are followed and in our
by-laws it states that “only registered businesses within the Province of Nova Scotia can vote during AGM/AGA’s and become members of the board. Members of the board are also members that can run for positions on the Executive Board, which will serve to represent and report back to the Board of Directors. Each new member approved under the NSITEN guidelines becomes an official voting member.”
This of course does not mean that we do not want to add additional voices around the table. We value and support the importance of having our Indigenous artists, crafters, cultural performers, cultural experts, youth involved in tourism and of course our Elders as part of this important process. It just means that in the official voting process, only registered businesses will be able to vote. Everyone as a collective can always participate in any of the events, training, online workshops, conferences and trade shows that we will be planning and bringing to you as part of our overall greater membership package.
FREE REGISTRATION (2023-24-25 FISCAL YEAR)
Mi’kmaw & Indigenous businesses only
The membership requirements to join the NSITEN will be straight forward with who we will be helping to represent, promote and provide benefits to as part of our ongoing organizational support services.
Updated Membership Benefits (Starting April 2023):
By joining as a new member we will provide updated information to you on a regular basis in a number of different formats. Regular updates by email, follow up phone calls directly to you, website updates, online zoom events including targeted training opportunities and at minimum quarterly meeting opportunities for all members (in person or online – depending on the pandemic gathering requirements).
INDUSTRY UPDATES (LOCAL/NATIONAL)
You will also get regular industry updates both locally, and Provincially. We will also provide National updates through our national affiliation with the Indigenous Tourism Association of Canada.
PARTICIPATION AT INDUSTRY EVENTS
We will also invite our members to participate at different tourism industry events that will help to better educate them about trends, provide key insights on product and experience development but also to provide opportunities for sales and promotion of your products, services and business profiles.
INDIGENOUS TOURISM DEVELOPMENT
NSITEN is also involved in a lot of the big picture development work in the growth of Indigenous tourism in our Province as well supporting the connection and growth Atlantic wide and nationally. We are involved in the development of opening new doors with the mainstream tourism industry partners, educating the mainstream corporate world on the cultural and historical significance of our traditional people to our traditional territories through a shared history with settler families that we now live and work with.
AUTHENTIC GUIDELINE DEVELOPMENT
We are also involved in supporting authentic guidelines that we hope will help our business owners, our artists/crafters and help to guide our authentic tourism experiences through the information from our Elders and community information sessions.
What this means is that we want to ensure that our products, traditional songs, dances, creations, stories, regalia, language, history and more is as real and true as possible. It also means that we want to ensure that our products are made locally as much as possible and made by the hands of our people. This is what true authenticity is, “Kinowey”… “Ours”.
BENEFITS FOR OUR SUPPORTING ALLIES/PARTNERS
We also want to provide benefits to our ally partners in the tourism industry as well as our government and not-for-profit organizations.
We want to help them to better understand who we are, how to work with our people the best possible way, how to gain insights on developing positive and progressive relationships that focus on action and results. We want to guide them in these very important learning opportunities through our Indigenous cultural awareness sessions.
This will help them to better understand how they can best help us but also with other Indigenous clients they will be working with as well.
Welcoming our new friends from around the world!
We are very happy to welcome our non-Indigenous allies and partners into our organization and that also comes with benefits. By being a supporter and ally for our NSITEN organization it makes you eligible for a 50% discount at all of our events. Also, we will also share all of our updates on our upcoming projects & events.
NON-VOTING ASSOCIATE MEMBERSHIP (FREE)
Non-voting associate membership is open to all interested applicants whether they be individuals, business owners, government organizations, community associations or tourism industry partners.
Due to the ongoing Covid-19 Pandemic, we will continue to provide FREE Registration to all Non-Voting Associate Members for 2022-2023 Fiscal Year is FREE. Starting April 1st, 2022.
Should you have any direct questions regarding NSITEN membership, please inquire further by contacting us at nsiten.info@gmail.com.
FUNDING SUPPORT & SPONSORSHIP
As part of our ongoing effort to secure much needed development dollars for the organization we will be putting a call out to multiple government, industry and community based organization in search of existing financial and support resources that will benefit the goals and objectives of NSITEN. We are thankful for the opportunity to work with all of our funding partners and allies that work to grow Indigenous tourism with us!
NSITEN CHAMPIONS
With the initial goals of growing capacity and transitioning of industry and business knowledge we will be searching to fill multiple seats with experienced individuals that will help to provide much needed guidance as the organization develops through its infancy stages. Should you be interested in helping with this process we welcome your application for one of these positions. Please inquire for further info.