As we build back better, is sustainable tourism enough to regenerate nature?

Sus­tain­able tour­ism is a com­plex puzzle with lots of mov­ing parts. Toss in regen­er­at­ive prin­ciples and it becomes even more con­found­ing. For­tu­nately there are those who think deeply about import­ant parts of the puzzle, such as anim­al wel­fare con­sult­ant Daniel Turn­er of ANIMONDIAL. In this “Good Tour­ism” Insight, Mr Turn­er shares how our industry might “build back bet­ter” for nature, wild­life, and the anim­als that are part of the travel & tour­ism experience.

Over the past months I have been buoyed by vari­ous reads indic­at­ing great­er sup­port for a more sus­tain­able and regen­er­at­ive approach to industry, busi­ness, and our lives post-COV­ID-19. The need is para­mount. Not­ing that COVID-19 res­ul­ted from the over-exploit­a­tion of nature, and to pre­vent future pan­dem­ics, human­ity must change its destruct­ive ways and strive to build back better.

I cer­tainly believe that sus­tain­ab­il­ity can no longer be regarded as an ‘aim to have’, but an integ­ral com­pon­ent of all that we do … but per­haps even this is no longer enough? Mere sus­tain­ab­il­ity may only pro­long future ruin.

Policy influ­en­cers in the travel & tour­ism sec­tor have long called for sus­tain­ab­il­ity in travel but, whilst cham­pioned by some, few busi­nesses appear to have taken up the man­date. Eco­nom­ic growth has trumped des­tin­a­tion well-being, and ‘over­tour­ism’ quickly gen­er­ated des­tin­a­tion degrad­a­tion and loc­al disdain.

In a pre­vi­ous ANIMONDIAL blog, I con­sidered the import­ance of nature and its biod­iversity; not only for our pro­ductiv­ity and prosper­ity, but more so as a nat­ur­al bar­ri­er against dis­ease. A healthy nat­ur­al world is essen­tial to our own well-being and sur­viv­al. Pre-COV­ID-19, tour­ism (and oth­er indus­tries) had already caused an imbal­ance in nature, res­ult­ing in biod­iversity loss, cli­mate change, and oth­er such chal­lenges between people and nature. As industry sec­tors rebuild post-COV­ID-19, per­haps there is no bet­ter time to right these wrongs? I believe people’s trust in travel and tour­ism depends on it.

Tour­ism must not only be sus­tain­able but, as many now recog­nise, it must also strive to make des­tin­a­tions bet­ter places: identi­fy and min­im­ise neg­at­ive impacts, adopt sus­tain­able and respons­ible meas­ures, sup­port and engage loc­al com­munit­ies, and com­mu­nic­ate the import­ance of doing so. This will help to return trust in travel.

How can travel & tourism build back better for animals?

Improv­ing travel & tourism’s inter­ac­tions with anim­als is an import­ant part of the sus­tain­able, regen­er­at­ive jour­ney. I believe travel & tour­ism busi­nesses can con­trib­ute — and bene­fit — in mul­tiple ways if they:

1. Max­im­ise their pos­it­ive impact by adopt­ing meas­ures to pro­tect the wel­fare and sur­viv­al of anim­als involved in their oper­a­tions and sup­ply chain. For example, as an altern­at­ive to a ‘stop sale’ boy­cott, which often places the anim­als involved at great­er risk, work with your sup­pli­ers to modi­fy the product and its activ­it­ies. This approach safe­guards loc­al people’s live­li­hoods and improves anim­als’ lives. ANIMONDIAL has so far developed solu­tions for Asi­an ele­phants and cap­tive whales and dolphins.
2. Build resi­li­ence against pub­lic health risks by pre­vent­ing dis­ease trans­fer between anim­als and human stake­hold­ers. For example, incor­por­ate an eval­u­ation of zoonot­ic dis­ease trans­fer­ence into Health & Safety checks of your sup­pli­ers and activ­it­ies. ANIMONDIAL col­lab­or­ates with audit­ing com­pany, Prever­isk, to offer a range of anim­al audit­ing ser­vices for peace of mind.
3. Com­bat the illeg­al wild­life trade, which threatens the sur­viv­al of thou­sands of endangered anim­al and plant spe­cies, each integ­ral to the good health of the nat­ur­al envir­on­ment. As an example, ensure your anim­al attrac­tion sup­pli­ers have not sourced anim­als from the wild (unless author­ised by the nation­al author­ity) or sell live, or parts of, anim­als or plants as souvenirs.
4. Invest-In-Nature, which is ANI­MON­DI­AL’s care­fully selec­ted port­fo­lio of anim­al pro­tec­tion pro­jects and altern­at­ive exper­i­ences. Instead of offer­ing a vis­it to a zoolo­gic­al col­lec­tion that may only dis­play wild­life to the pub­lic, con­sider offer­ing a fully-vet­ted, ANI­MON­DI­AL-endorsed anim­al sanc­tu­ary instead, provid­ing your cus­tom­ers with an edu­ca­tion­al, as well as an enjoy­able, experience.
5. Con­trib­ute to return­ing trust in travel & tour­ism via ANIMONDIAL’s new recog­ni­tion scheme that show­cases your com­mit­ment to min­im­ising neg­at­ive impact on anim­als and the nat­ur­al world.

There is no bet­ter time to act #For­Nature and to #Build­Back­Bet­ter for animals.

Agree? Dis­agree? Share your reas­ons in the com­ments below. Or write a “GT” Insight. The “Good Tour­ism” Blog wel­comes diversity of opin­ion about our travel & tour­ism industry because travel & tour­ism is everyone’s business.

Fea­tured image (top of post): Ele­phants and the com­munity. Image © Mahouts Ele­phant Found­a­tion. Sup­plied by author.

About the author

Daniel Turn­er is co-founder and dir­ect­or of ANIMONDIAL, the glob­al con­sultancy advoc­at­ing the need for tour­ism to bet­ter pro­tect anim­als and nature. ANIMONDIAL offers impar­tial advice and bespoke guid­ance to “build back bet­ter for anim­als”. Sign up to ANIMONDIAL’s free news­let­ter.