Low Impact: Camping is free at Cozy Corner in Tasmania’s Bay of Fires. Photo: Alamy
I’ll be the first to admit that my eyes roll when someone tells me the word “sustainability”. It’s one of those cheeky words that suggests there’s going to be a talk about what’s good and what’s not good for me soon.
Human nature is more responsive to being persuaded than they are told, as all parents learn when faced with a child who does not swallow their peas. (First lesson – poking the cheek won’t help.)
With this in mind, many people in the travel industry have used the word “regenerative” when talking about ecological or green initiatives, and emphasize the positive benefits of traveling that is considerate of others and our increasingly fragile planet.
When you take something, you put something else aside, like a kind of cosmic book exchange.
Gwyneth Paltrow may sound a bit regenerative, but after a week at a wellness resort in the back of Byron Bay, you can get a result. “Eco” and “green”, which I used in the previous paragraph, are vague, often remain unchallenged and are used too regularly as PR spinners, like the gas guzzling bus with the GREEN TOURS logo. Although we kind of understand what they mean.
Whatever the words, I think people understand that uninhibited mass tourism, while egalitarian, has reached the tipping point – and is now negatively impacting the communities and environments from which it might once have benefited.
By and large, the juggernaut of climate change is threatening our most popular tourist attractions. They may not be there anymore, at least not in the same form, if we don’t give them urgent attention.
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UNESCO has proposed reclassifying the Great Barrier Reef as endangered, threatening its removal from the coveted World Heritage List. It is unimaginable that this could happen, and so quickly, and yet the first mass coral bleaching has been warning since 2016.
The way things are, the only chance our children and grandchildren have to see coral is in an aquarium. In fact, in a few decades, when we hit 2 degrees warming, we might be the only way to experience it. Only one percent of the world’s corals can survive this warming, with massive effects on the health of the planet.
Research through the search engine Booking.com shows that many travelers are afraid of climate change and are ready to take on more responsibility in their travel decisions so that future generations can enjoy the same travel joys.
The Sustainable Travel Report 2021 found that 72 percent of Australian travelers consider sustainable travel essential, with 63 percent saying they avoid popular destinations and attractions in order to dissipate the benefits of travel, while 72 percent want to stay in sustainable accommodations and 69 percent want to use more environmentally friendly means of transport such as walking, cycling and public transport and 43 percent are of the opinion that there are too few sustainable options.
So the will to be a good traveler isn’t really lacking, but there are often obstacles in the way. One of them is the belief that having a good time and being a good citizen of the world are mutually exclusive. A friend said to me yesterday: “When I go on vacation I want to have fun, I don’t want to feel guilty about it.”
Keep the following in mind – many of the most fun and rewarding travel experiences can also be positive for the planet. Think camping, hiking, food tours with locals or local guides, hanging out in cafes and spending money in communities, visiting artists, taking long train rides, or helping scientists with research as part of a visit to the Great Barrier Reef .
Another obstacle is the notion that sustainable travel will cost more. It’s true that some of the world’s greenest travel brands – including Six Senses, Soneva, Aman, One & Only – are the big brands. The same goes for small ship cruises and tailor-made small group tours. Travelers pay a premium for space, access, fewer crowds, and the service that comes with it.
Many of these brands invest heavily in the legacies of nature, societies, and the historic buildings in which they exist, and they do so for future generations, not just those who can now afford to visit them. But they remain inaccessible for many travelers.
Yet they are only a tiny fraction of what is available in the world of travel.
The pandemic has shown that experiencing the outdoors and participating in community are two things travelers want most. While we limit ourselves to traveling within Australia, we have 20 World Heritage sites on the continent ready to explore, and eight percent of our landmass are national parks, all of which are inexpensive to get to.
We can visit destinations devastated by bushfires and the loss of tourism due to closed borders. We can go for a walk with the Aboriginal elders and learn more about the land. We can travel to rural cities and learn about life outside the cities. We can stay overnight on farms, visit small wineries, surf on uncrowded breaks.
That is sustainable travel. And in many cases we are already doing it.
