Five Eco – conscious trends in 2021 when traveling

The term Eco-Conscious is a lifestyle word that refers to a business that is aware of its impact on its surrounding environment. Conscious Consumers are those who are increasingly mindful of purchasing decisions and buying habits. They will tend to do their research and read labels before investing in a new product, usually from a brand with Sustainability at its core.

When traveling, consider hotels that are Eco-Conscious to align with your lifestyle.

1.- Zero waste & plastic free

Zero Waste is a practice that aims to design (or redesign) and manage products and processes to avoid and eliminate the generation of waste materials and conserve and recover natural resources. Zero Waste living encourages changing behavior to reduce personal waste consumption.

A Plastic-free product does not contain plastic, including disposable plastic, within the design or use single-use plastics for packaging.

Tips everyone can use to move toward the Zero Waste Movement:

• Refuse what we do not need (for example, at restaurants, opt to go straw-less)
• Reduce what we use, especially if we are not using it
• Reusing and using what we have until it no longer works, not when it no longer is in fashion
• Repairing what we can
• Don’t be surprised to find plastic bottles when traveling in some hotels that are sustainable as part of their preventive measures set in place during the pandemic (COVID-19)
• AccorHotels North and Central America pledged to prohibit the use of plastic straws.
• Several hotels in the North and Central American region have already implemented a “straw upon request only” policy and have replaced plastic straws with paper or eco-friendly alternatives, including Fairmont Southampton, Fairmont Chateau Lake Louise, Fairmont Mayakoba, Fairmont Pacific Rim, Fairmont Hotel Vancouver and Novotel Monterrey Valle.

Remember Your Zero Waste Kit

Don’t forget to pack your reusables! Create yourself a little zero waste travel kit that includes essentials such as a reusable water bottle, bamboo cutlery, a metal straw, and shopping bags.

Use health care products made from natural materials such as a compostable toothbrush. Just by paying attention to how much single-use plastic you use while traveling, you will soon realize there are so many ways to minimize your Waste. However, you’ll encounter different problems in different countries.

2.- Organic and Fair Trade

Organic products are those that include ingredients from farming practices that aim to avoid the use of artificial fertilizers or synthetic chemicals, such as pesticides or herbicides.

Farmers work towards a strict set of standards that aim to keep soils, ecosystems, and people healthy, stressing the need to maintain and improve land and water quality, animal warfare, human health, and environmental sustainability. Organic products, including food and clothing, do not use genetically modified crops, growth promoters, or hormones. Organic certifications can be applied at any supply chain level, from seed suppliers, farmers, food processors, or clothing manufacturers to retailers and restaurants.

Organic certification is administrated by either independent organizations or government agencies, depending on the country.

Fair Trade refers to the movement and organizations striving towards stable prices, decent working conditions, social and environmental standards, and the empowering of farmers and workers worldwide, addressing the injustices of conventional trade, which traditionally discriminates against the most impoverished farmers and workers. Fairtrade requires companies to pay sustainable prices.

Tips everyone can use when choosing Organic products

• Read the labels, organic packaged foods will be marked with a certified organic seal.
• Quality over quantity, the more organic food you eat in place of conventional food, the less toxins and toxic residues you ingest
• Choose hotel brands with organic and/or sustainable menus.

3.- Green Home and green vacations

Green homes come in many shapes and sizes, but each one contains materials and functions that support a sustainable way of life. For example, some may include an area for composting or collecting rainwater. Additionally, there may be focused importance on what the home is made of or how it processes waste.

Home sustainability is a common practice that homeowners choose to use better energy efficiency, water usage, and available resources. By considering your energy output and where you can better optimize how you use power throughout your home, you can promote better sustainability in the new year.

Green Vacation is the new way to travel. What makes a hotel or resort green? For starters, some green hotels use composting to get rid of waste and are outfitted with gray water recycling systems, which purify and reuse laundry, bathing and dishwashing water. Green hotels also support service projects and education to encourage sustainable energy practices in their communities.

Home Tips

• Pursue energy star options by replacing outdated appliances or electronics with energy star models is a cost-saving, green-living upgrade
• Source your food locally
• Use green products, you can concoct healthy, green cleaners using common household items like baking soda and vinegar that will get your home clean and shiny without harmful side effects

Travel Tips

• Look for green vacations, the rainforest alliance certification seal is earned by hotels working together to create a world where people and nature thrive in harmony.
• Choose an eco-friendly car for road trips
• Buy reef safe sunscreen to avoid harming the ocean
• Look for hotels with bikes to reduce your carbon foot print and participate in Earth-friendly transportation options.
• Find tour companies that operate sustainably

4.– Vegan lifestyle, cruelty free

The Vegan Society defines the vegan lifestyle as “a way of living which seeks to exclude, as far as is possible and practicable, all forms of exploitation of, and cruelty to, animals for food, clothing or any other purpose.”

A vegan lifestyle is a way of life that denounces the idea that other animals exist for our use. A product that is Vegan does not contain any animal or animal-derived ingredients. To many, the term “Vegan” also means that a product is free from animal testing. Vegan products are usually those of food, skincare, makeup, or accessories.

Travel Tips for Vegans

• Research your destination, the happy cow app is great to find all the local vegan places.
• Inform your hotel that you are vegan to save time from going through trouble of unexpected meal delays
• Get a vegan passport! Traveling out of the country? You can try to use Google translate to explain what a “vegan” is in different languages.

For more information on restaurant reservations, please contact our concierge at myk.concierge@fairmont.com