COVID-19

Scroll down for posts that have been tagged with “COVID-19” — the coronavir­us SARS-CoV­‑2 dis­ease and the coronavir­us SARS-CoV­‑2 pan­dem­ic — and how it has affected travel & tour­ism des­tin­a­tions and industry stakeholders.

Tags are inform­al. The “Good Tour­ism” Blog tries not to get bogged down with ter­min­o­logy and defin­i­tions so you may dis­agree with tags applied (or not applied) to a post. Feel free to com­ment on any post you think has been incor­rectly or insuf­fi­ciently tagged. “GT” encour­ages good-faith debate and discussion.

Tourism in crisis: A Myanmar elephant camp & community pivot to plan B


An elephant of Green Hill Valley Elephant Camp, Shan state, Myanmar. (Image by Hollis Burbank-Hammarlund). Inset: GHV's Founders Tin Win Maw (Left) and Htun Htun Wynn (Image courtesy of GHV).

Through the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic and tour­ism crisis, hopes rest on con­tin­gency “plan B” to sus­tain the retired log­ging ele­phants of Green Hill Val­ley, Myan­mar and the com­munity of people who love them.  Hol­lis Bur­b­ank-Ham­­marlund of Work for Wild Life Inter­na­tion­al knows them well, hav­ing led ele­phant health­care and wel­fare work­shops at the camp in 2018 and […]

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Tourism in crisis: How local staff supported their communities in Myanmar

September 24, 2020
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Ku Mel project team image featured in "Tourism in crisis: How our local staff supported their communities in Myanmar"

In this “Good Tour­ism” Insight, Nia Klatte of Khiri Reach, the char­it­able arm of “GT” Part­ner Khiri Travel, shares how her organ­isa­tion’s Myan­­mar-based teams stepped up to sup­port host com­munit­ies dur­ing the COV­­ID-related travel & tour­ism clos­ures. This pan­dem­ic has shown us again how big our respons­ib­il­ity is for the people with whom we work; […]

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Why tourism degrowth just won’t do after COVID-19

July 14, 2020
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"The Only Sustainable Growth is Degrowth", according to this stencil graffito. Paul Sableman (CC BY 2.0) via Flickr. "GT" ran a filter. https://www.flickr.com/photos/pasa/14486751845

Among tour­ism aca­dem­ics and thinkers today — the out­spoken ones at least — Jim Butcher is one of the few who would chal­lenge the notion that post-pan­­dem­ic tour­ism must — for the sake of the plan­et — be much dimin­ished from what it was. He does just that in this “Good Tour­ism” Insight.  In light of the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic, much has been said […]

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Keeping elephants healthy under the cloud of COVID-19


Dr Wachiraporn Toonrongchang and team at at a private camp in Chiang Mai, Thailand. Image supplied by Dr Nissa Mututanont of the GTAEF Foundation.

News from the field — from the Ele­phant Health­care Emer­gency Life­line Fund in Chi­ang Mai, Thai­l­and — by Hol­lis Bur­b­ank-Ham­­marlund of Work for Wild Life Inter­na­tion­al. What’s the say­ing? An ounce of pre­ven­tion is worth a pound of cure? For Thailand’s tour­ism ele­phants con­fined to lock-down mode — along with the facil­it­ies and people who care for them — the need for routine and […]

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How to change an iconic travel & tourism experience … for good

June 24, 2020

From the roadside. Mount Sefton, Mt Cook National Park, New Zealand. Image by Bernard Spragg (CC0) via Picryl. https://picryl.com/media/mount-sefton-mt-cook-np-nz-68cc04

Mak­ing things bet­ter rarely neces­sit­ates tear­ing everything down and start­ing again. Josie Major of GOOD Travel (no rela­tion) describes how research and a little ima­gin­a­tion can turn a quint­es­sen­tial New Zea­l­and travel exper­i­ence — the road trip — into some­thing poten­tially much bet­ter for every­one. Thanks to “Good Tour­ism” Insight Part­ner Second Look World­wide for invit­ing Josie to con­trib­ute this “GT” […]

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Who dares wins: Who will hit the reset button?

May 22, 2020

Push to reset the world. By Jose Antonio Gallego Vázquez (CC0) via unsplash.

A “GT” Insight into the mind of the man who leads one of the world’s sig­ni­fic­ant travel & tour­ism industry organ­isa­tions: Dr Mario Hardy, chief of the Pacific Asia Travel Asso­ci­ation. What does he think about the crisis in which our industry finds itself? Over the past few months, we are reminded every day that […]

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