ATMA ECO VILLAS
GUATAPE, COLOMBIA
SUSTAINABLE PRACTICES
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This property makes efforts to reduce food waste and is run on 100% renewable electricity. Most of the food provided at the property is locally sourced, and the ecological villas are equipped with water-efficient toilets and showers.
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COMMUNITY IMPACT
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Atma Eco Villas invests a percentage of revenue back into community projects or sustainability projects, tours, and activities organized by local guides and businesses. These local guides and businesses provide guests with information about local ecosystems, history, and culture.
BIOHABITATS
QUINDIO, COLOMBIA
SUSTAINABLE PRACTICES
Biohabitats is a beautiful hotel to immerse yourself in nature and magical ecological design.
Their primary goal is to promote permaculture, sustainability, and living in harmony with nature.
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Some of their eco initiatives include their Bio Experiences tour led by ecologists to educate visitors about the wildlife and land, planting over 200 fruit trees, and offering guests an opportunity to plant a tree.
CALANOA
AMAZONAS, COLOMBIA
SUSTAINABLE PRACTICES
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This property makes efforts to reduce food waste and is run on 100% renewable electricity. Most of the food provided at the property is locally sourced, and the eco villas are equipped with water-efficient toilets & and showers, as are constructed with recycled materials.
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COMMUNITY IMPACT
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Calanoa employs local people from the area and works in conjunction with guides native to the neighboring village. They offer amazing experiences with medicine workers and healers who lineage in the area go back several generations. They also sell unique jewelry and crafts handmade by women in the nearby village.
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GITANA DEL MAR
TAYRONA, COLOMBIA
SUSTAINABLE PRACTICES
Gitana del Mar has a strong commitment to sustainable development and pollution prevention. They practice low energy consumption by not having air conditioning or hot water instead offering accommodation with fans and some with outdoor showers to cleanse in the natural jungle climate.
They have a beach clean up program in efforts to spread consciousness within the local community, educating people to care for the environment. They provide trash-bags to take on beach walks and in exchange for a full bag of trash you’ll get a free beer.
Gitana del Mar arranges incredible ecotourism experiences and works in partnership with knowledgeable guides in the area who are also committed to the education and preservation of the Sierra Nevada.
COMMUNITY IMPACT
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La Sierra Artist Residency is a non-profit organization that uses the power of art to impact lives and generate awareness and cultural exchange.
Click here to learn more.
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HOTEL LAS ISLAS BARU
BARU ISLAND, COLOMBIA
SUSTAINABLE PRACTICES
Located on the majestic island of Baru and awarded Best Luxury Sustainable Hotel in South America in 2019, they envisioned a hotel where each bungalow would be built into the existing natural surroundings and vegetation. Allowing the trees to determine the spot of each accommodation, using recycled and organic materials, and designed with eco-friendly infrastructure.
They practice sustainable welfare measures using a water treatment technique that utilizes a desalination plant and purifying machine for the harnessing of seawater, they also carry out a wastewater treatment which involves a process that allows liquid to return by dripping to the earth.
The wellness of the natural environment and the resident wildlife species is one of the hotel's priorities. One innovative way they are caring for the area is by installing specialized cameras with motion sensors in order to record conditions of the local fauna to monitor growth or changes.
Conservation and positive contribution to the different ecosystems are of utmost importance and they've planted over 11,000 native trees, implemented the restorative coral sowing technique, and installed special cages at the seabed in order to protect the reefs around the hotel. On top of that, they also have a coral nursery! The nursery is a conservation project in which the hotel, with the help of the Malpelo Foundation and Conservation International, seeks to provide the necessary conditions for the coral species to reproduce and thus form new reefs.
COMMUNITY IMPACT
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Isla Baru offers a few different tours with guides hired from the surrounding towns. The hotel enrolls them in English school and employs them to help support the local community. The hotel donates up to 200 tons of water daily to the community that otherwise relies on a once-a-month delivery by boat from Cartagena. Las Islas also is offering a more permanent solution by building wells to capture sea water and running it through a desalination process to provide drinking water.
The gift shop sells items made locally to support the artisans in the community.
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THE ECO HOTEL LA CABAÑA
SALENTO, COLOMBIA
SUSTAINABLE PRACTICES
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Eco Hotel La Cabana is run by a family dedicated to preserving the traditions of their ancestors, in an environment of social and environmental responsibility. A family that wants to share with visitors the stories that are today the intangible heritage of Quindío and the coffee region.
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They offer Eco tours and incredible Bandeja paisa vegan style!
EL VALLE LODGE
SAMANA, DOMINCAN REPUBLIC
SUSTAINABLE PRACTICES
El Valle Lodge is committed to the conservation of the environment and the social and economic development of the community adhering to the ecotourism guidelines defined by The International Ecotourism Society.
The lodge's organic materials are composted and used as animal feed on neighboring farms, and 90% of their energy comes from a local hydroelectric plant.
The hotel restaurant, Gitana, is truly farm to table, using locally grown ingredients purchased from the community.
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COMMUNITY IMPACT
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El Valle Lodge carries out volunteer beach cleanups, promotes learning about medicinal plants of the area, and offers composting workshops. Additionally offering wonderful tours with knowledgeable guides native to Samana.
FIDANKA
KALKAN, TURKEY
One of the most defining features of Fidanka is that it is a huge botanical garden! Orange, lemon, olive, pomegranate, tangerine, eucalyptus, avocado, rosary tree, lilyland, mimosa, cypress, pine grow throughout the lush property landscape.
This property has taken considerable measures toward sustainability planting hundreds of trees, shrubbery, and flowers, using the best organic ingredients at there in house restaurant, and constructing rooms out of recycled and antique materials.
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COMMUNITY IMPACT
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They support local small producers for their Gastronomy.
THE WESTIST HOTEL & SPA
KALKAN, TURKEY
SUSTAINABLE PRACTICES
​This lovely boutique hotel is making many efforts to run their property sustainably such as making recycling bins available to guests and waste is recycled, no single use items in bathrooms, use of water-efficient toilets and showers, most food provided at the property is locally sourced, and most lighting throughout the property uses energy-efficient LED bulbs.
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COMMUNITY IMPACT
The hotel invests a percentage of revenue back into community projects or sustainability projects, they offer tours and activities organized by local guides and businesses, local artists are offered a platform to display their talents, and they provide guests with info about local ecosystems, history, and culture.
PAOLYN HOUSEBOAT
CORON ISLAND, PHILIPPINES
SUSTAINABLE PRACTICES
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One of our most memorable stays, this houseboat located in an otherworldly beautiful secluded lagoon is totally eco-friendly and makes its own electricity and fresh water run entirely on solar power. No waste is dumped in the water, but collected and brought to another island where they have built their own eco-conscious septic tank system. They take the utmost care of the coral reefs and surrounding natural life and sell their own biodegradable products such as reef-safe sunscreen.
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COMMUNITY IMPACT
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Paolyn Houseboat employs 124 staff, most of them members of the Tagbanua Tribe who are the indigenous people of Coron Island. Throughout the Covid-19 pandemic they have been supporting the two Tagbanua tribe villages with food, medicines and helped pay hospital bills for their members
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