8 easy ways to understand what is sustainable tourism

Traveling always gives fresh air to the people who are willing to spend some time traveling. I mostly recommend visiting nature oriented places where there are no busy hustle-bustle of a city and no grandeur shopping malls around. Only nature would be available to meet you there. If you choose those places for your vacation, you will be beneficial aesthetically. If you follow this blog, I will tell you how ecotourism supports sustainable tourism and what is sustainable tourism. Today in this write up I will share 8 tips through which you can help the local stakeholders as well as the local economy to breathe happily after a pandemic situation.

1) Stay in a homestay instead of hotels

Hotels are easily available around the cities. Homestays are not so common still you can book the homestay through OTAs like Airbnb, booking.com etc. they cut a good amount of commission, but at least you will be able to help the local people. Your money partially goes to the local people’s pocket instead of going to the big hotel chains’ fund.

If you are keen to visit hills around Sikkim, North Bengal, Darjeeling, Assam, etc. you will get a lot of homestays. I prefer booking them directly or by any tour operator who works majorly in this area. If you choose to stay in some offbeat places, you may not be able to get the hotels. In that case, a homestay would be your only choice.

2 ) Enjoy Local foods

I never like Chinese food while I travel. Chinese food has a kind of invasive nature. Though I like Chinese food but always prefer to have local foods while traveling. It will help the local restaurants as well.

If you are onshore, don’t forget to taste the seafood made by local people. If you are in the hills, you will be enriched by Tibetan and Nepali preparations as well.
No place will be enjoyed fully unless tasting their own authenticated cuisine.

3) Hiring local guides, travel agents, drivers can be important steps to understand What is sustainable tourism

I always try to hire local guides, travel agents, and drivers who know the place very well. Hiring local people for our trips can save money and time. It is important to hire a guide for birding trips because they are local people and know where to find the bird. If you are not doing birding trips, still you can hire local people or book your trips from someone who knows the place very well.

4) Visit local souvenir shops

Most of the time we collect some memento or souvenir from a place where we visit. Shopping is a very engaging way to connect with the locals. It will help the local economy. Always try to buy something made of local people. Usually, most of the souvenir shops keep Chinese items. Ask them for local items or get help from the local travel agents or homestay owner or driver. They have years of experience and will help you to find the exact thing you are looking for.
You can buy some tribal jewelry or handmade shawls, wooden or clay made craft items made by the villagers or tribal people. It may cost you some extra bucks and maybe a few more hours to find, but those will definitely be considered to be a good collectible.

I bought plants from a local nursery. I got some beautiful foliage plants and cactus, succulent in a good deal!

5 ) Donate some goods

Donate to the local people can be a good option. You may not need to donate the money, but the goods or dress which you may not need anymore.

If you visit the interior villages of India, you may get to see some really needy people who are willing to receive goods from you. Ask them politely before offering. It will also help you to connect with them more. We should be polite enough before asking them to take our offerings.

6) Shopping from the local market is an innovative way to understand What is sustainable tourism

If you need something that is available in the local market, then buy from there. Don’t buy from shopping malls if you want to help the locals or if you really want to understand what is sustainable tourism. The true fragrance of a place can be felt if you go to the market area, you can feel the pulse of the place for sure.

7) Volunteer or clean

If you are going to spend about a month or half of it in a new tourist place, then try to connect with some local NGO that may need some volunteers. You can add some meaning to your travel by helping others.
In Chatakpur, on our way to Pukhuri we cleaned the road from unwanted plastics. We should aware people that plastics are not made for throwing in a tourist place to make it filthy.

Watch my Video on this topic, which is made in Bengali with English subtitles.

8) Spread the word about the place

If we want to help the locals we have to be a voice for them. It is very common that the tribals or villagers may not have the access to the internet or they don’t know how to use social media as their voice. We can spread their words to the world to make the place more popular, so that local people can get more business. Through our blog posts and vlogs, we can guide people to understand what is sustainable tourism and the importance of it.

The aim of sustainable tourism is to increase the benefits and to reduce the negative impacts caused by tourism for destinations. Every traveler should learn how to be a part of it. This noble aim is to protect natural environments, wildlife and natural resources when developing and managing tourism activities.I hope through this detailed discussion I can portray what is sustainable tourism and how we can use it while traveling. Adopting these methods can help us to add some value to our traveling. Let me know in a comment down below if you are agreed with these points. If you have any other tips in mind please feel free to share them in the comment section.