NEW YORK - The eco-minded Prince Harry is embarking on a massive travel sustainability initiative in partnership with key travel providers.

They aim to improve the practices of the global industry amid an ever-increasing number of travellers.

The Duke of Sussex picked Amsterdam, a city hit hard by over-tourism, to announce Travalyst at a news conference today with his partners, Booking.com; TripAdvisor; Visa; China's largest travel company, Ctrip; and the Ctrip-owned fare aggregator Skyscanner.

The long-term initiative is focused on tackling the travel industry's impact on climate change, improving wildlife conservation, and protecting the environment in top tourist spots around the world.

It aims to increase the amount of tourism dollars that go to local communities, and find answers to over-tourism.

In a statement, the duke says as tourism inevitably grows, it's critically important to accelerate the adoption of sustainable practices worldwide, and to balance this growth with the needs of the environment and the local population.

He adds that bringing companies, consumers and communities together is our best chance to protect destinations and ecosystems for future generations.

Harry drew criticism this summer when he and his family took a private jet to go on vacation, despite the flight's carbon impact on the planet.

They had flown to the home of singer Elton John, who said the aircraft offered them needed privacy and protection, and was carbon-neutral because it was offset by a contribution to Carbon Footprint.

Last year, the number of international trips taken globally reached 1.4 billion, a number reached two years faster than originally projected by the United Nations tourism agency -- the World Tourism Organization.

 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

We are excited to announce the launch of ‘Travalyst’, a global initiative striving to change the impact of travel, for good. Partnering alongside key travel industry giants @Bookingcom, #Ctrip, @Skyscanner, @TripAdvisor and @Visa_US, our aim is to spark a movement to transform the future of travel, putting communities at the heart of the solution. We believe in the power and importance of travel. We also have a shared responsibility to our planet and to each other. • “I want to start with a little bit of background as to specifically why I’m here today, because as you may know, I am not a tourism or business expert, but through my travels I have observed the unique relationship between community and environment, and have noticed something alarming. There wasn’t the symbiosis or connection there needed to be and I wanted to understand why. I am one of those people fortunate enough to have a platform and I want to use it to tackle hard problems, in the hope of finding solutions…and that’s how Travalyst was born” - The Duke of Sussex The name #Travalyst comes from The Duke and partners viewing our role in sustainable travel as catalysts to accelerate positive changes in travel. Travel + catalyst = Travalyst #Travalyst aims to make travel more sustainable, to help protect destinations and benefit communities long into the future, and to enable consumers to make more environmental friendly choices whilst traveling. The Duke of Sussex, having invited the founding partners to start the conversation, believes that the organisations - with operations in nearly every country, hundreds of millions of customers that use their products every day, and business relationships around the world - have sufficient influence and the critical mass necessary to catalyse real system change in the travel industry, for the benefit of destinations, communities and ecosystems. To discover more about the new initiative, visit www.Travalyst.org

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