Happy ethical holidays!

Brian Woolnough gives advice on making sure your summer holiday is ethical and not exploitative
During the summer most of us think of holidays. We used to think of holidays to Bournemouth, then to Majorca or France; increasingly we are thinking of even more distant parts – India, Africa or South America. Such travel is taking our affluence into poorer regions of the world, to developing countries. Tourism is big business, both in this country and abroad. The public in the UK now spend something like £20 billion per year on international tourism, of which over £2billion is spend in developing countries(almost half the amount that the UK government spends on overseas aid!). In fact, eleven of the world’s twelve poorest countries depend on tourism for a significant part of their foreign exchange and employment.

There are many reasons why we go on holidays; to get away from the pressures at home, to find relaxation and refreshment, to spend more time with our families and friends, to develop our hobbies, to see something more of the beauties of the world and to meet its people, to make the world a better place – or at least not to make it a worse place. For it is likely that our overseas holidays will affect not only our own lives but also the lives of those in the countries we visit – for better or for worse. Which brings us to ethical tourism.

Does your holiday enhance or exploit the local community? Is your hotel foreign owned, using imported food and cheap local labour, and taking the profits out of the country, or locally owned, using local food with responsible working conditions, and feeding into the local economy? Has your holiday resort been built sympathetically with the local environment or has it destroyed and distorted the countryside for the benefit of western tourists? Is the holiday encouraging and building on the local culture or is it importing foreign, western ways? Ethical tourism or exploitative tourism? A couple of examples from recent visits to India. Two excellent hotels in Goa; one Indian owned, blending in with the coastal environment, employing local staff and resources, being used by the local community for weddings and as a training centre for local chefs, the other American owned, with a picture of the founders of the chain prominent in the entrance lounge, built in western style and dominating the local headland, with imported food and exported profits. Two restaurants in Delhi; one, the Quality, Indian owned, with excellent Indian food and traditional service, the other, Pizza Hut, identical in food and service to any other Pizza Hut in the world and quite foreign to this local culture. The former in each case was reinforcing and benefiting the local community, the latter was exploiting it.

So what? Can we do anything to make our holidays both beneficial to ourselves and to the local community? Yes, quite a lot. Check with your local travel agency that your holiday, your hotel, does fit in with the principles of ethical tourism –many tour operators are aware of these issues now and responsive to them. Find out all you can about the local situation you will be visiting, and respect and explore the culture when you get there. When abroad be consciously aware of the local community, and get to know them. ‘Look behind the curtains’. Use public transport where possible – it is never less than ‘interesting’. Shop and eat where the locals do. Go to church with the locals, you will be inspired as you recognise the oneness of the family of God worldwide –especially, but not necessarily, if you share the same language. Many of the most moving services I have enjoyed have been in churches in other countries. And, of course, seek to leave the environment as you found it, if not better.

And if you find things around your holiday more exploitative than ethical, do not be afraid to register your disapproval and, even, campaign with others when you return. There are too many examples of horrendous tourism practices, from lager louts and property developers which destroy the environment, through ‘all-in’ holiday packages and the watering of golf courses which destroy the local farming, to sex tourism in Asia which destroys vulnerable lives, for us to be complacent about the effects of our holidays on the countries we visit. But above all, when your turn comes, do have a great holiday. May it refresh and enhance your lives as it does those in the local community.

Brian Woolnough is a volunteer for Tearfund

If you want to find out more about ethical tourism contact the following;www.tearfund.org (for A Tearfund guide to Tourism), www.foc-uk.com , www.tourismconcern.org.uk .