Wanderlust has championed responsible travel since its founding 30 years ago. Here, Editor-in-chief George Kipouros explains why now is the time to launch our Travel Green List...
There is no escaping it: more and more people are catching the travel bug. This highly contagious virus has been given a boost over the last three decades by cheaper flights, self-styled accommodation, mega cruise ships and the advent of social media. While we love welcoming new people to our community of passionate travellers, we’re aware that many sites – natural and cultural – and the communities that live alongside them are bearing the weight of our desire for travel. Mention places such as Barcelona, Amsterdam, Venice or even reader-favourite Machu Picchu now, and the word ‘overtourism’ is the first one that springs to mind.
Wanderlust has championed responsible travel since its founding, 30 years ago. We’ve tried to encourage taking the road less travelled, making fewer yet longer and more purposeful trips, travelling in the off-season and engaging meaningfully with local communities. Sustainability in travel is an evolving narrative, made up of a collection of many different things. It starts with being mindful about our overall impact when travelling.
It’s often you, our readers, that point us in the right direction for how we should responsibly cover travel experiences and stays, or bring to our attention green initiatives worth shouting about. We felt that the time was finally right to compile a different kind of ‘hot list’: The Travel Green List, dedicated to showcasing the most innovative champions of sustainability in travel, including destinations, accommodation and tour operators. Our newly appointed sustainability editor, Karen Edwards, worked with the whole team at Wanderlust in sifting through hundreds of potential entries and ideas from all over the world. While we couldn’t feature everything, we were thrilled to see so much good being done across the globe.
The Wanderlust Green List showcases the world's best green initiatives, including engaging with local communities (Shutterstock)
The Travel Green List also looks at the cities pioneering sustainability initiatives (Shutterstock)
In addition, we asked some of our best friends in travel, such as Michael Palin, Kate Humble and Simon Reeve, to give us their practical tips on how to improve our symbiosis with the planet while travelling. You can read these here.
We’re also adding many of your suggestions to our broader editorial coverage. For example, we’ve stopped recommending booking short-term apartment stays through providers such as Airbnb, after seeing the devastating impact they have had on urban communities in popular destinations. We continue to recommend train travel as a first resort; and when that’s not possible, we advocate non-stop flights (where available), especially on newer, more fuel-efficient aircraft. Similarly, we’re doubling down on our encouragement for carbon-offsetting all travel. You may have also noticed that we don’t cover large-scale cruise travel, other than expedition and river trips in smaller vessels, as we don’t think that dumping 4,000 people in a popular port destination for just a day is the right way to see the world.
There is still much to improve on, both for us at Wanderlust and across the travel industry. Yet, our core belief that travel can be a force for good is only reinforced by the incredible initiatives we have uncovered for our Travel Green List.
The world is a gloriously beautiful place, and its stories of human achievement are never-ending. We now need to work together to ensure that all this is still here for future generations to experience. After all, a Wanderlust traveller is a responsible traveller.
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