Members Practising Sustainable Tourism

Africa Collection has been dealing with South Africa as a tourist destination for 20+ years. We have seen this amazing country develop, and visitor numbers steadily increase. However, in many areas, social & economic transformation has been slower than anticipated. Africa Collection is partnering with Uthando (meaning Love) in Cape Town, a non-profit organisation that supports an amazing collection of innovative and inspiring community development projects. In 2017 we will donate £5 000 to work with an exciting youth initiative:

PingOut
Also referred to as street or outdoor ping-pong, PingOut is more than simply ping-pong! The PingOut project is based on the idea of bringing social togetherness, physical activity, design and art into the public space. We aim to provide 5 x 1.2 ton ping-pong tables - fully manufactured, delivered and installed (by a civil engineer).

During your stay in Cape Town you can join one of Uthando's authentic, uplifting and fun day tours, visiting the community projects which Uthando is working with and supporting - and by doing so you are also making a donation, as part of the tour price. The focus of the tour is to visit interesting, innovative and inspiring community development projects, and at the same time helping these wonderful initiatives continue with their efforts. 'Pack For a Cause' is a project whereby we will also advise you what you can bring and donate when visiting the community projects.

• Bringing Ping Pong to the community in Cape Town

In 2017 as part of our AITO PROTECT project, Scandinavian Travel introduced carbon neutral holidays and offset 181 tonnes of carbon. Following a successful launch, from July 2018 we will become the first Scandinavian specialist Tour Operator to exclusively provide carbon neutral holidays.

Scandinavia has a reputation as an environmentally responsible region, and as specialists in this area Scandinavian Travel wanted to make similar commitments to the environment and climate. There is a significant carbon footprint associated with travel, especially greenhouse gas emissions from air travel, and limiting the footprint of our customers continues to be an appropriate pledge for us.

This year we aim to offset 500 tonnes of carbon by covering the cost to offset the per person carbon footprint in all our holiday packages. As in 2017, offsetting will be through two accredited projects, but this year we are letting our customers choose the second project we donate to. Voting will take place in July through an online poll sent out to our customer database by email and social media. This year we aim to raise awareness of our pledge internally and externally.

Our carbon neutral holidays provide Scandinavian Travel customers with an effortless way of travelling responsibly in Scandinavia. By delivering carbon neutral products we are directly contributing to the fight against global climate change. This directly benefits our destinations and will help protect the winter sports industry for future generations. Scandinavian Travel clients can be proud to book and travel with a responsible Tour Operator.

• http://www.scandinavian-travel.co.uk/carbon-neutral-holidays

Adventure Alternative is dedicated to sharing the benefits of tourism with our local staff and companies, and we are well known for being responsible and fair as well as professional and fun. We believe in compassionate leadership.

• We empower our staff through training and working together and we invest in their future.
• Each local Adventure Alternative company receives financial support and training. We will be investing £2000 in training for around 50 staff.

Nomadic Thoughts are the UK office of New Lifeline - supporting vulnerable people through social, health and education programmes.

• We are proud to continue working with and supporting a variety of sustainability projects across Mexico and Guatemala.
• http://nomadicthoughts.com/speak-to-an-expert/sustainable-tourism/new-lifeline/

As a part of Wild Frontiers traveller code we are asking our travellers to consider using refillable, filtered water bottles while on holiday to help reduce the ever growing problem of plastic water bottle waste across the planet.

• A million plastic bottles are purchased every minute
• Efforts to recycle this amount of plastic are struggling to keep up.
• Read more
• https://www.wildfrontierstravel.com/en_GB/filtered-water-bottles

Martin Randall Travel is proud to now support the India Solar Water Heating project through its carbon offset scheme.

• This project provides in-house hot water supplies fueled by renewable energy to homes, community buildings and small to medium-sized businesses throughout India.
• We are partnered with this project through the organisation Carbon Neutral.

Along with our commitment to long-term projects, the Wild Frontiers Foundation also supports communities we visit with funding for a particular need.

• Community support funding:
• £700 for a new school bus in Ladakh, India
• Tree planting programme in Bijaipur Village, India
• 3 new beds for maternity ward at Bijaipur hospital, India
• Computer lab & wrestling mats at Bijaipur Village School

Through classroom sponsorship, we are able to help our partners at the Lone Buffalo Foundation to offer free English lessons to children from poor rural communities in northern Laos.

• $100 a month classroom sponsorship provides:
• 6 hours of English tuition per week
• Class of 15 to 25 young people

What we believe is the only grant of its type in this region of northern Pakistan, our £500 annual scholarship fund offers five students a year the opportunity to move onto higher education.

• The scholarship programme was established in 2012
• Five students a year have been awarded a scholarship
• Both boys and girls awarded scholarships