Thomson offers travel to over 80 destinations worldwide - therefore numerous countries, cultures, wildlife and environments. One thing that all of these places have in common is the need to ensure that tourism is operated in a way that is sustainable for the people that live there and for future generations of travellers.

In all destinations Thomson works with local organisations and often the local administration to smooth the way for people to visit in a way which is considerate to the local communities and environments and often provides economic benefit through new sources of income.

A key part of any travel experience is the hotel, apartment or villa that is home for the duration of the stay. Concerns about the impact that the modern lifestyle has on the environment are making more of us make greener choices – such as ecological cleaning products, reducing the amount of water we use, saving energy and recycling our waste.

But these good practices needn’t stop when we travel as Thomson has audited many of its hotels’ environmental performance and awarded the elite hotels with Green Medals. The other hotels will be audited and the awards for 2007 will be across the hotel portfolio. The Green Medal symbol on the website and in the brochures indicates a hotel that has achieved high standards against over 100 criteria for the environment and staff wellbeing.

For 2006 2 hotels were the joint winners and 13 other hotels achieved Green Medal status

The full list of Green Medal winning hotels is:

OVERALL GREEN MEDAL WINNERS:

Coral Beach Hotel and Resort 5T, Coral Bay, Cyprus

Club Magic Life 5T, Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt

GREEN MEDAL WINNERS:

Riu Palace Helena Sands 5T, Sunny Beach, Bulgaria

Sheraton Miramar Resort, El Gouna, Egypt

Movenpick Resort, El Gouna, Egypt

Club Robinson Cala Serena 5T, Cal D’or, Majorca

Hotel Sol y Mar Makadi Marine 4T, Makadi Bay, Egypt

Baron Palms Resort 5T, Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt

Grecotel Eva Palace 4T, Komeno, Corfu

Hotel Audax, Cala Galdana, Minorca

Fuerte el Rompido, Costa de La Luz

Hotel Sol Gavilanes 4T, Cala Galdana, Minorca

Alexander The Great Beach Hotel, Paphos, Cyprus

Hotel Sunrise Beach, Protaras, Cyprus

Laguna Materada, Porec, Croatia

 

Advice about the role that customers can play in sustainable travel is provided for customers at a number of stages of their journey; on the Thomson website, on a dedicated page of the inflight magazine and through a three minute inflight video, produced in conjunction with the Travel Foundation, and also in the information books and welcome get togethers that are held in many holiday destinations.

Trips to local events, authentic villages and fiestas give an insight into local cultures and provide new sources of revenue. For example Thomson offers a trip in Cyprus to visit an inland village which has been devised to support what was a dying village. By providing a new source of income the village is now thriving and the local people are able to stay in the village rather than leaving the village to find work, as they had to do in the past.

The Thomson Kids Zone clubs in beach and ski destinations present information about the resort and local people in an engaging and educational way. There is also an activity which the clubs run that is about reusing, recycling and caring for the environment.

Thomson is involved in many international co-operation projects aiming to save biodiversity and protection of species as well as to help local population raising substantial amounts of money.

These are just some of the worthwhile projects to which the Thomson teams and guests have made valuable contributions in our destinations.

Tenerife - Environment Award

TUI’s International Environment Award, first awarded in 1991, is presented to environmental and nature protection organisations or outstanding inter-regional distinct contributions which make a decisive and exemplary contribution to the protection and maintenance of nature and the environment in TUI holiday destinations.

This year TUI's international environment award was presented to two organisations on the island of Tenerife: The Instituto de Turismo Responsable (OTR) and the Loro Parque Fundación received the prize that comes with an award of 10,000 euros. Click here to find out more on this.

 

Malta - Thomson Malta Heritage and Environment

Thomson Malta Heritage & Environment was created in 1998 by the TUI UK manager in Malta and is now called the World of TUI Thomson Malta Heritage and Environment. The idea of the Fund is to compensate in a small way with the local host communities of this country, any negative impacts that mass Tourism may generate. Working with local conservation organizations to restore and preserve some of Malta’s historical monuments as well as donations to schools and a number of local projects.  Also included within our excursion programme are such venues managed by voluntary organizations that depend on our support. The fund has a system whereby a levy is generated when selling excursions to our customers and this amount is then deposited in the fund.

It is certainly worthy of note that many overseas universities have approached The Fund to learn how this success has been achieved and also to praise their efforts.

 

Egypt - Bedouin Communities

Thomson’s quad biking, jeep safari and Bedouin dinner trips are all operated with the local Bedouin community in the Sinai desert. All of these trips provide opportunities for guests to talk and interact with their Bedouin hosts – and the Bedouin way of life and how the community sustains itself and survives life in the desert are explained.

 

Egypt - Sunshine Project International

 

Thomson has supported the Sunshine Orphanage in Luxor for a number of years. Through the dedication of the team in Egypt and the generosity of holidaymakers Thomson has been able to raise enough funds to build the charity’s new proposed 6 room kindergarten. 

www.sunshine-international.org.uk

 

Tunisia - Children's Charities

"Horizons de l'enfant au Sahel" is an orphanage for orphans/abandoned babies from 0-2 years.  Through fundraising activities by the resort team, including a weekly raffle and guest donations made at 'Showstoppers'- representatives rep's cabaret it has been possible to fund two nurses for the orphanage. Fundraising activities have also provided essential equipment for the kidney dialysis unit in the children’s ward of a local hospital.

 

Dominican Republic - The Dream Project

The Dream Project, Dominican Republic, is supported by the Thomson resort team. This charity aims to provide funds, supplies and volunteers to small schools in the area, and is involved with building facilities such as libraries, additional classrooms and toilets for schools. Thomson are working with the Dream Project with donations of clothes, toys, books, toiletries etc.

www.dominicandream.org

 

Zakynthos - Sea Turtle Protection Society of Greece

Turtle Protection Society of Zakynthos have operated for the last 20 years. The Society is 100% voluntary and relies on donations from the general public and the selling of merchandise. The group educates and entertains visitors with a talk and slide show on board the Thomson Turtle Island Cruise. The volunteers sell turtle themed gifts and enable guests to adopt a turtle, nest, hatchling or injured turtle - our female adoptee is named Thomson. They campaigned for the banning of water sports in the Laganas Bay and have successfully protected several beaches on the island that house the nesting of the Loggerhead Turtles. As a result the number of turtles that were previously declining have now stabilised. The turtles are also a prime attraction to the island and as a result of our work with the Society we are able to obtain a good balance between having a very profitable excursion and still supporting the environment

http://www.archelon.gr/eng/wois.htm

 

Zakynthos - Marine Park

Marine park is an organisation dedicated to increasing tourist awareness of the marine life around Zakynthos – informing people about zones of the coastline where marine life can be seen to designated breeding areas which should not be visited.

 

Zakynthos - Zakynthian Animal Welfare Fund (ZAWF)

This is a group of volunteers living on the island who rescue, aid and rehome animals. The main animals are cats and dogs. One of the Thomson team managers is one of the volunteers and at the moment has 27 cats, 8 dogs, 21 ducks, 10 chickens, one rabbit and a goat! They neuter strays, provide medicine and work with a dog shelter in Germany to send and rehome dogs out there.

 

Egypt - Reef and Marine Life

Thomson’s What’s On Welcome Meetings in resort explain the fragile nature of the reef and provide holidaymakers and divers with advice and guidelines for how to explore the underwater environment without damaging the coral or the marine life to which it is home.  Thomson’s hotel partners also have individual initiatives to help customers enjoy and understand the environment they have chosen as the setting for their holiday.

 

Gran Canaria - Forests

“Plan de Embellecimiento” (to beautify) is a project that aims to recuperate and maintain the natural landscape of the island. The object of this plan is to involve as many inhabitants of the island as possible doing voluntary work in a plan called “Enamorate de mi”  (fall in love with me) working on reforestation to increase the forest mass of the island but also maintaining existing forest areas. We donate funds to the project.

 

ECPAT

TUI UK is also a member of ECPAT (End Child Prostitution and Trafficking). We were the first holiday company to sign the WTO’s code of conduct against the sexual exploitation of children.  During 2005 TUI UK attended training on identifying child abuse and implementing procedures to deal with reporting incidents of child abuse that were not already covered by our own child protection policy. To learn more about the ECPAT, go on: www.ecpat.org.uk