At Royal Mountain Travel, we don’t just practice sustainable tourism, but sustainable living. As one of our core values, sustainability is woven through every element of our business and we’re proud of the work we’ve done to put our environment and our people first.
As a Travelife Certified company, we know every small step we take to protect our environment has a powerful ripple effect. Eliminating single-use plastics is one of the most important steps we can take and we’re committed to it. Earlier this year, we gave each of our team members reusable water bottles, 500 in all. Each reusable bottle replaces roughly 217 plastic ones in a year, which means roughly 108,500 plastic bottles will be saved from landfills this year. We know this step starts with us, but will inspire similar actions among our guests and colleagues because we didn’t stop there
We spread the word to the hotels and homestays in our network and many have already committed to minimizing plastic bottle use as well. They’ll now supply guests with refillable glass bottles for water in hotel rooms or install water purifier stations in the lodges (plastic bottles are available for a fee only). Leading this movement for our staff, our hotel suppliers and our travelers is a priority that will help us protect our land and oceans. Have you made a similar commitment in your business?
As a larger investment, we’ve installed solar panels at the Royal Mountain Travel office to power our building with renewable energy and we’ve begun to transition all of the vehicles in our fleet to electric cars starting with the first two this year.
These are key steps to reducing our impact on the environment, but sustainability doesn’t stop with eco-friendly practices.
Community empowerment is just as important to us, and that’s why we aim to set the standards in our country and within the travel industry when it comes to business practices that benefit locals. We are dedicated to creating economic opportunities to support indigenous and rural areas. We employ locals. We pay fair wages, offer paid internships and paid training opportunities. We invest in programs that empower women. About half of our staff are women, including most of the drivers in those electric vehicles we mentioned. But there’s no ceiling. We encourage our female staff members to train and develop into leadership roles, such as tour guides. Have you made a similar effort to empower your local community through your business?
We know we’re on the right path because we were honored with the Resilience through Cultural Diversity Award from the International Institute for Peace through Tourism earlier this summer. We’re extremely proud to lead the way to bring positive impact to locals in remote areas of Nepal.
By making our sustainability initiatives public, we hope to set an example for other businesses, as well as attract values-aligned travel agents, operators and travelers to work with us. Learn more about our sustainable tourism values here.
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