“Good Tourism” Insights

Dancers, singers, and drummers from a local women’s cooperative welcome visitors to the Red Rocks Cultural Center in Nyakinama village, Rwanda. Pic by David Gillbanks.

Dan­cers, sing­ers, and drum­mers from a loc­al women’s cooper­at­ive wel­come vis­it­ors to the Red Rocks Cul­tur­al Cen­ter in Nyak­i­n­ama vil­lage, Rwanda. Pic by Dav­id Gillbanks.

“Good Tour­ism” Insights are ori­gin­al posts by aca­dem­ics, experts, and prac­ti­tion­ers who are keen to share their sus­tain­able tour­ism and respons­ible tour­ism insights, expert­ise, and exper­i­ences, in plain Eng­lish, for the bene­fit of all travel & tour­ism stakeholders.

Each “GT” Insight rep­res­ents the opin­ion of its author, NOT neces­sar­ily the opin­ion of The “Good Tour­ism” Blog, its Part­ners, or its pub­lish­er. The “Good Tour­ism” Blog neither pays nor is paid for any “GT” Insight. 

Any­one with an informed and sin­cerely-held opin­ion about travel & tour­ism is wel­come to sub­mit a “GT” Insight for pub­lic­a­tion. The “GT” Insight guidelines are very simple.

Climate change, COVID-19, and the need for global systemic change

March 2, 2021

Working women protest in Dhaka, Bangladesh. By MARUF_RAHMAN (CC0) via Pixabay. https://pixabay.com/photos/women-crowd-protest-protesters-5963960/

Tan­ner C Knorr picks up themes dis­cussed in a webin­ar by the US-based Cen­ter for Respons­ible Travel and maps them onto five core ten­ets of the Future of Tour­ism Coali­tion. Mr Knorr is the founder of two “Good Tour­ism” Part­ners: Second Look World­wide and Off Sea­son Adven­tures. This is his fourth “Good Tour­ism” Insight. “Crisis […]

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Tourism’s democratic deficit

February 25, 2021

There's more than one way. By geralt (CC0) via Pixabay.

Travel & tour­is­m’s host com­munit­ies need altern­at­ive vis­ions for devel­op­ment and the power to choose between them, accord­ing to lec­turer and writer Jim Butcher. It’s his second “Good Tour­ism” Insight. Eth­ic­al tour­ism is strongly asso­ci­ated with ‘com­munity empower­ment’ and ‘loc­al par­ti­cip­a­tion’. But how does this relate to the import­ant debates raging about nation­al demo­cracy: populism, […]

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What to keep, change, do in a crisis (and why we should give a sh*t)

February 23, 2021

A Live Ningaloo tour group encounters humpback whales. Photo: Ningaloo Aviation & Jacob Hill supplied by Live Ningaloo.

Sonia Beck­with’s tiny Aus­trali­an eco­tour­ism oper­a­tion Live Nin­ga­loo faced an exist­en­tial crisis in 2020, like so many travel & tour­ism busi­nesses glob­ally did (and still do). In this “Good Tour­ism” Insight, her second, Ms Beck­with shares the value of caring — a lot! — and how she har­nesses and sus­tains it. When my part­ner and I foun­ded our micro tourism […]

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Travel & tourism’s ‘critical’ rethink and its imperative shift to circular economics

February 18, 2021
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Maya Bay, Koh Phi Phi Leh, Thailand in 2014. By 2017, tsome 3,500 people visited the beach made famous by The Beach. Image by Nicolas Vollmer (CC BY 2.0) via Wikimedia Commons. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Maya_Bay_boats.jpg overlaid by a question mark by geralt (CC0) via Pixabay. https://www.freeimg.net/photo/1633662/questionmark-who-where-how

For the sake of grow­ing well-being and shar­ing the tour­ism com­mons with the great­er major­ity, cir­cu­lar eco­nom­ic approaches to travel & tour­ism must replace neo­lib­er­al cap­it­al­ist growth mod­els. To make that argu­ment, research­er Phoebe Ever­ing­ham takes a crit­ic­al the­or­et­ic­al approach. It’s a “Good Tour­ism” Insight. [Thanks to Joseph M Cheer for invit­ing Dr Ever­ing­ham to […]

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Sustainable tourism’s endless balancing act: Preserving, promoting Ras Al Khaimah

February 16, 2021

Abseiling in Ras Al Khaimah. Source: Ras Al Khaimah Tourism Development Authority

The new year is an oppor­tun­ity to reflect on the val­ues that mat­ter to the travel & tour­ism industry even after the pan­dem­ic ends, accord­ing to Raki Phil­lips of the Ras Al Khaimah Tour­ism Devel­op­ment Author­ity. In this “Good Tour­ism” Insight, Mr Phil­lips explains how the Emir­ate is embed­ding sus­tain­ab­il­ity into everything it does. Let me […]

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What do you do when carbon offsetting is off-putting? Plant trees for travel

February 11, 2021

What do you do when carbon offsetting is off-putting? Plant trees for travel

Do you trust travel & tour­ism-related car­bon off­set schemes? Nico Nich­olas and his part­ner Elkie did­n’t, which is why they did some research and foun­ded Trees4Travel. In this “Good Tour­ism” Insight, Mr Nich­olas shares who and what inspired them.  As an entre­pren­eur­i­al couple, Elkie and I have spent our work­ing lives trav­el­ling the globe. We […]

Read More What do you do when carbon offsetting is off-putting? Plant trees for travel