Latin Trails Committed to Sustainable Tourism
Latin Trails recognizes the impact of tourism activity both on local cultures and on the environment. It realizes the importance of preserving the cultural and natural heritage of the South American destinations visited by travelers. As such, it is a strong advocate of sustainable tourism practices, constantly reviewing its South America tour programs in order to find ways to minimize the impact of its visits on the localities it operates in.
Latin Trails takes responsible travel seriously, working with local communities and conservation experts to minimize the impact of travel. It runs an eco-friendly office and is continuously enrolling employees in development programs in order to raise awareness on environmental and cultural impact. And beyond that, Latin Trails takes the extra step to take active action towards environmental and cultural protection, taking part in many activities towards reducing its impact and offering sustainable tourism programs throughout South America.
The company has chosen Quito, Ecuador, as its headquarters and as its main call center, where there is 12 hours of natural light year round allowing the offices to keep its use of artificial lighting at a minimum. Latin Trail’s offices are equipped with compact fluorescent bulbs, which alone will reduce CO2 emissions by thousands of pounds every year.
Latin Trails invites travelers to off-set their travel footprint to and from adventures and consider off-setting travel before and after a South America vacation. Travelers can also help by offsetting car and air travel.
Latin Trails offers 2 options for carbon offsetting an adventure: Purchase off-sets online from several programs. That includes a full-day offsetting trip in the travel program and participation in one of Latin Trails’ reforestation programs. For those that really want to make a difference, there is the opportunity to participate in a full week of reforestation and offset carbon emissions for a full year.
All Latin Trails t-shirts for guests and leaders are made with 100% organic cotton and designed by local artisans, all water bottles are recyclable, and the company distributes local crafts that have been produced with sustainable and recycled materials and always pays a fair price to local craftsmen.
In general, Latin Trails’ responsible tourism policies are based on these three adjectives: sustainable, responsible, and participative, and these are not just words – these are actions that are integrated into every aspect of the company’s business from quality products and services, to users and suppliers involved in the tourism activities.
