Gap Adventures doubles selection of 'voluntourism' trips

If you like to make a difference while you’re on holiday (and I don’t mean just to your suntan) you’ll be interested to hear that Gap Adventures is doubling its selection of ‘voluntourism’ trips.

The adventure touring company has introduced 13 new volunteering options for next year, ranging from planting trees in Nepal to building an eco-friendly playground in the Galapagos; and from caring for orphaned gibbons in Thailand to helping out on a coffee farm in El Salvador.

I caught up with Gap’s John Warner at World Travel Market last week, who explained that people are more and more interested in having a “meaningful connection” with a local community while on holiday.

“We get evaluation forms at the end of the every trip, and people never talk about Machu Picchu being the highlight. It’s the time they spent playing football with or teaching the kids of a local village,” he said.

For Gap Adventures, ‘voluntourism’ does not mean spending your entire holiday getting your hands dirty. The volunteering element might only make up a few days of the overall itinerary. John said that tourists touring around a region, spending their money in its hotels and eating in its restaurants, is just as important as volunteer work in supporting the community.

Gap Adventures sends 100,000 travellers on holiday each year, and has a separate not-for-profit arm, Planeterra, which funds community projects around the world as a way of giving back. Many of the touring itineraries that Gap sells include a visit to one of Planeterra’s 30 projects. But John told me there are plans for big expansion here too. “Our five year goal is to have a project in every country in which we take tours,” he said.

The company is riding high at the moment, after winning three different awards for sustainable travel in just six weeks. Gap Adventures won a Global Vision Award from Travel and Leisure magazine, followed by Conde Nast Traveller’s World Savers Award and, at last week’s WTM, it was presented with a World Tourism Award.

“It’s great to win awards for our commitment to sustainability, because it’s the ethos that underpins our whole company,” John said. “With us, it’s long-established and it’s heartfelt.”

www.gapadventures.com

By Philippa Jacks.