News and questions (without answers) from the week ending January 25, 2026

Your digest of travel & tour­ism news and views — and the ques­tions they eli­cit — from the week end­ing Sunday, Janu­ary 25, 2026. This is draf­ted by Gem­ini AI in the impar­tial spir­it and skep­tic­al style of The “Good Tour­ism” Blog (“GT”) under the dir­ec­tion of “GT’s” very human publisher.

The weather and the wallet

The head­line of the week is a famil­i­ar one: “Thou­sands of tour­ists stranded”. 

As unex­pec­ted extreme weath­er grounds flights and halts itin­er­ar­ies, the fra­gil­ity of the glob­al travel net­work is exposed yet again. 

But while the industry focuses on ‘resi­li­ence’ through infra­struc­ture spend­ing — such as the new mil­lions pledged for North Queens­land—a quieter fund­ing crisis is unfolding.

Reports that USAID fund­ing cuts are hit­ting rur­al regions of Colom­bia high­light a grim trade-off. Just as these com­munit­ies attempt to trans­ition from illi­cit eco­nom­ies to tour­ism, the fin­an­cial rug is being pulled out from under them. 

As wealthy nations scramble to storm-proof their own play­grounds, are the devel­op­ment funds prom­ised to the Glob­al South the first cas­u­alty of the budget wars?

Wild expectations: Rights, rides, and removal

The treat­ment of anim­als — and the people who live along­side them — remains a flash­point for eth­ic­al tour­ism, with des­tin­a­tions tak­ing vastly dif­fer­ent approaches to ‘pro­tec­tion’.

• Trunks down: In a sig­ni­fic­ant win for anim­al wel­fare advoc­ates, the Bali Zoo has offi­cially ended ele­phant rides, sig­nal­ing that one of South­east Asia’s most per­sist­ent tour­ist tropes is finally facing retire­ment (World Anim­al Pro­tec­tion).
• Cor­ridor con­flicts: Con­versely, in Tan­zania, the cre­ation of a wild­life cor­ridor con­tin­ues to exert pres­sure on the Maa­sai people, illus­trat­ing the recur­ring con­flict between con­ser­va­tion goals and Indi­gen­ous land rights (DW).
• Wolf watch: In the US, the eth­ics of wild­life encoun­ters are being tested at sanc­tu­ar­ies, where the line between ‘edu­ca­tion’ and ‘exploit­a­tion’ is drawn at the fence line of a wolf enclos­ure (Islands).
• Lights out: Mean­while, Ger­many has des­ig­nated the Kyr­itz-Rup­piner Heath as its tenth Inter­na­tion­al Dark Sky Place, prov­ing that some­times the best thing we can do for nature (and tour­ism) is simply to switch off the lights (Dark­Sky Inter­na­tion­al).

If ‘sav­ing nature’ for tour­ists requires dis­pla­cing the people who have stew­ar­ded it for cen­tur­ies, whose defin­i­tion of sus­tain­ab­il­ity are we actu­ally using?

Con­tents ^

The fuel fog: Scraps, obstacles, and non-CO2 effects

The avi­ation industry con­tin­ues to prom­ise a guilt-free future fueled by innov­a­tion, but the tech­nic­al and logist­ic­al hurdles remain stub­bornly high.

• Obstacle course: A new study from Aspen has found “sig­ni­fic­ant obstacles” to the loc­al pro­duc­tion of Sus­tain­able Avi­ation Fuel (SAF), cast­ing doubt on the scalab­il­ity of the industry’s favour­ite sil­ver bul­let (The Aspen Times).
• The oth­er emis­sions: Engin­eers are warn­ing that while SAF might cut car­bon, we still do not fully under­stand — or reg­u­late — the non-CO2 cli­mate impacts of avi­ation, such as con­trails, which could be just as dam­aging (IMechE).
• Feed­ing the fleet: Optim­ism remains, how­ever, with research­ers claim­ing a “ground­break­ing dis­cov­ery” in con­vert­ing food scraps to fuel, and farm­ers view­ing avi­ation as the “next fron­ti­er” for crop mar­kets (Yahoo News) (Brown­field Ag News).
• Elec­tric dreams: On the hard­ware front, com­pan­ies like Evio and Hori­zon Air­craft are push­ing ahead with hybrid-elec­tric designs inten­ded to dis­rupt the region­al mar­ket, prom­ising a clean­er, quieter short-haul future (Run­way Girl Net­work).

Are we innov­at­ing our way to a sus­tain­able future, or are we just diver­si­fy­ing the ways we burn resources to keep the planes in the air?

Con­tents ^

Local realities: Access, recovery, and geopolitics

Away from the high-tech labs, the week’s news under­scores that tour­ism suc­cess often hinges on basic infra­struc­ture, polit­ic­al sta­bil­ity, and inclusivity.

• Fund­ing cuts: In Colom­bia, cuts to USAID fund­ing are threat­en­ing rur­al regions where tour­ism was seen as a vital peace-build­ing tool, show­ing how quickly geo­pol­it­ic­al shifts can strangle loc­al devel­op­ment (The World).
• Bar­ri­er-free: Brit­ish Columbia is put­ting the spot­light on ‘access­ible tour­ism’, remind­ing the industry that true sus­tain­ab­il­ity includes social equity and access for people with dis­ab­il­it­ies (BCBusi­ness).
• Weath­er­ing the storm: In the wake of extreme weath­er, thou­sands of tour­ists were left stran­ded, and Jamaica’s hotels are in reopen­ing mode, high­light­ing that ‘resi­li­ence’ is not just a buzzword but an oper­a­tion­al neces­sity (Yahoo News) (Carib­bean Journ­al).
• Geo­pol­it­ic­al ice: The New York Times reports on the inter­sec­tion of Don­ald Trump and Green­land tour­ism, sug­gest­ing that even the world’s most remote ice sheet is not immune to the heat of glob­al polit­ics (New York Times).

When the fund­ing dries up and the storms roll in, will the ‘resi­li­ent’ tour­ism industry pro­tect its work­ers and com­munit­ies, or just its assets?

Con­tents ^

The year ahead

The final week of Janu­ary 2026 leaves us with a sense of pre­cari­ous­ness. We have high hopes for elec­tric planes and low-car­bon fuels, but on the ground, we are see­ing fund­ing cuts for the vul­ner­able and weath­er shocks for the masses. The gap between the industry’s “green” prom­ises and the gritty real­ity of sur­viv­al seems to be widening.

Con­tents ^

What do you think? 

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