Environmental Sustainability Principles
Planeterra and our community partners care about the places they call home and believe that tourism should help to improve environmental well-being for the benefit of communities, not degrade or misuse the natural resources and environment.
![](https://planeterra.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/enviricon.png)
![](https://planeterra.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Untitled-design-2021-04-22T142153.803.png)
We recommend the following activities be avoided to the best of a community’s ability to protect the natural environment and the people that live there:
- Activities that result in pollution of air, water or land through the introduction of harmful materials or waste, resulting in negative health impacts for communities
- Activities motivated by tourism that lead to the degradation of ecosystems, such as clear-cutting forests
- Use of single-use plastics where they can be avoided
- Overuse of natural resources that could lead to their depletion, or insufficient resources for community members in order to meet the needs of travellers.
![](https://planeterra.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Untitled-design-2021-04-22T142159.677.png)
We consider the following activities as good practices:
- When using plastics, following the “Reduce, Reuse, Recycle” model to decrease environmental impacts
- Proper management of trash through local systems
- Regularly monitor natural environments and track changes over time, applying responsive management where necessary.
Overall, Planeterra and our community partners believe that travel experiences should leave a net positive impact on the environment for the community, and acknowledge that different practices are needed to suit different environments.