Make it count
When Covid-19 struck and international travel collapsed, serious conservation problems emerged. Reserves no longer received entrance fees to fund protection and illegal poaching reportedly increased. Conservation organisations reliant on tourism revenue were suddenly in trouble.
At its best, wildlife tourism is able to benefit conservation through direct and indirect financial contributions, and awareness-raising. At its worst, it can be carbon-intensive, negatively impact wildlife and generate socio-economic problems. So what choices can we make to ensure our holidays count as much as possible?
Obviously, travelling locally and on public transport helps enormously when it comes to carbon counting. But if we do choose to fly, there are measures we can take. We can offset our emissions; we can plump for ‘slow travel’ rather than rushing around; and we can spend in local communities and protected areas, eagerly paying reserve entry fees, booking local guides and buying local products. The more we spend locally, the more value we provide to the wildlife we’ve come to see.
When it comes to accommodation, we can prioritise lodges that directly fund conservation or benefit local communities, including those run by conservation bodies or community groups. We can favour ‘ecolodges’ that minimise resource use, source locally and are built using recycled materials. We can then contract local tour companies who aim to ‘travel for good’, drawing on research by organisations such as Responsible Travel and Terra Incognita. If travelling with UK-based companies, we can choose those that ‘give back’ to conservation. We can also give back as
