Responsible Travel

Why this page exists

"Responsible travel" is used loosely enough to mean almost nothing. This page is about the specific decisions that change who benefits from your journey.

Where your money goes

The single largest factor is ownership. A lodge owned and staffed locally keeps far more of what you spend in the area than an international chain. Community conservancies, where landowners lease grazing land for wildlife and share tourism revenue, are a more direct arrangement still.

Worth asking any operator, plainly: who owns the land, how the community shares in the revenue, and whether guides are locally recruited and accredited. The answers vary widely, and an operator who cannot answer has told you something.

Photography and consent

Ask before photographing people. This is not a formality — it is the difference between a portrait and a trophy. Be especially careful at religious sites, in markets, at ceremonies, and around children. If someone declines, that is the end of it.

Places of memory

Sites connected to slavery, colonialism and apartheid are places of mourning for many of the people standing beside you. Follow your guide on photography, keep your voice down, and allow unstructured time afterwards rather than moving straight to the next stop.

Wildlife

Avoid any encounter that involves touching, riding, walking with or feeding predators, and be sceptical of facilities offering cub petting. Keep to the agreed distance at sightings, and treat a driver who pressures an animal for a better photograph as a problem worth reporting.

The honest limits of this page

We are published by a travel company, so treat our advice on choosing an operator with that in mind — including when it points at ours. The questions above are the ones we would want asked of us.