As family vacations are in full swing, road trips planned and taken, and fall travel upon us, I’d like to point out the Lonely Planet Responsible Travel section.
Lonely Planet Responsible Travel
Lonely Planet Responsible Travel is about encouraging travellers to think about things like carbon emisions before they travel.
Lonely Planet, for example, recently launched a carbon emissions scheme for offsetting staff and authors flights, and they’ve included a Climate Change blurb in all Lonely Planet guidebooks. Code Green is another example of Lonely Planet’s commitment to responsible travel.
Here’s the keyword term to learn for 2006: START (Sustainable Travel And Responsible Tourism), Lonely Planet’s name for these activities.
Check out the Lonely Planet website to read more about START, Lonely Planet founders Tony and Maureen Wheeler’s thoughts on responsible travel, as well as travel tips, the real cost of your next flight, what Lonely Planet is doing to reduce waste in the production and distribution of their books, and The Lonely Planet Foundation, through which Lonely Planet commits 5% of their annual profit to charity partners around the globe.
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START is certainly a good start, but that’s all it is. Lonely Planet is currently offering destinations in their regular guidebooks that are far away from being responsible.
I am currently active in sustainable tourism in Ecuador and can’t recommend their new guide about this country. You can compile an extra guide dedicated to responsible travel, but that will just not suffice. As long as community-based tourism and other forms of responsible tourism are underlighted in the regular guides, what’s the use of this guide?