Ecotourism: Taking Pictures and Leaving Footprints: November 2009

Sunday, November 22, 2009

Green Credibility is like Credibility:Easy to Lose

I recently read that Responsible Travel, an authoritative green travelling website, changed its minds on carbon offset and decided not to offer it as product any more and condemn the use of it. As it is quite controversial to offset flights, I can understand their new position. The only thing that worries me is to what extent it can dent the credibility of green advocates.

I mean if you have been defending and offering something for seven years and suddenly you change your mind, how people are going to take it next time you suggest something?I am not saying it is wrong, it just appears to me that as really no one has an idea on how to efficiently tackle climate change, we should be more cautious on what we put forward. I just fear that if something like this happen again, nobody would not listen any more. And you can feel this if you look at the tweets about it.

Saturday, November 21, 2009

Commitments in Action

I wrote recently about how it is important to commit ourselves to make things happen. Here is the example of Jake Harriman, the group's founder and CEO of Nuru International, a new NGO. Think whatever you want, but someone like him is an example that deserves our dearest respect, so let's imitate him.

The End (Jake's Story) from Nuru International on Vimeo.

And from what you can see on Twitter, seems that he got the attention of people. Wish him good luck!

Sunday, November 15, 2009

Changing Ourselves Before Changing the World

I just left the UK for a few days and I realized how defiant you can become when you live in a big city: when a stranger starts talking to you you will for sure adopt a defensive attitude. This will be a problem when you are in a place where people are just curious about you and are ready to give you tips about the place you are. To sum it up, you miss opportunities.

So how is that linked to ecotourism, travelling and any green issue? Well, defiance has become the strongest obstacle to overcome these problems. Because we are sceptical of our politicians (OK for good reasons), other countries policies and to some extent ourselves, we can only achieve the smallest things for the environment. Cynicism is king and I wish I could commit a regicide. But this is not a great state of mind: cynicism is widespread because this is the only thing we can use to hide our despair and disappointment. So maybe it is time to transform this into anger, which will be the fuel alimenting the machine of change.

Sunday, November 1, 2009

Greenwashing is Greenwashing, Wherever It Comes from!

Image via Wikipedia

I already wrote about the case of EDF and Team Green Britain. Of course it is an example of Greenwashing and I think that the fact that the "Advertising Standards Authority of the UK received 149 complaints that the ads misleadingly implied EDF Energy is a green energy company and a British organisation" shows that people did not buy it.

The only thing that annoys me in this affair is that people seem to be more motivated by the fact it is a French company than by the actual greenwashing element of their campaign. I feel it is just wrong because in this case the nationality is not the problem, this is the misleading character of the ad. Would it better if it was BP? Honestly, rebranding the company Beyond Petroleum and put more green colours on their website will not change the fact they are an oil company that still makes more than 90% of its business selling fossil fuel. This is probaly the most achieved example of greenwashing, but I guess as they are British it is all right

Ecotourism: Taking Pictures and Leaving Footprints

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