The Latin American Travel Association (LATA) has launched the 'LATA Sustainability Charter' outlining key sustainability principles the organisation will be asking its members to implement.  The Charter was revealed during Experience Latin America (ela), one of Europe's largest trade shows dedicated to Latin America.

The LATA Sustainability Charter has been launched as part of LATA's strategy to continue to grow environmental awareness, to propel eco-tourism to the top of the agenda for UK travellers and to encourage its members to adopt an eco-sensitive approach to travel in Latin America.

Over the coming year, LATA will be designing a set of tools to help LATA members' benchmark their organisation's current position and to help them create realistic, achievable goals that can help further improve their environmental credentials.

At ela 2018, LATA introduced five broad principles that form the foundation of the Charter, offering an insight into the areas on which the organisation will be focusing. These include:

• To operate in a way that minimises an organisation's negative impact on the environment
• To ensure that tourists are made aware of local environmental challenges and what part they play in sustainable tourism
• To ensure that employees and contractors are treated fairly
• To ensure that the communities in which the organisation operates benefits positively from tourism
• To operate in a way that ensures that the economic benefits of tourism are fairly distributed throughout the supply chain

A number of organisations have already pledged their allegiance to supporting sustainable travel in Latin America by signing the LATA Sustainability Charter at ela 2018. These include: Revealed Travel, Select Latin America, St Helena Tourism, the Brazilian tourism board (EMBRATUR), Muda! Brazilian Collective for Responsible Tourism and the Belize Tourism Board.

With tourism numbers in Latin America increasing year on year, sustainability continues to be a main priority for the Latin American travel industry. The LATA Sustainability Charter will celebrate the successes that have already been achieved by many local companies and tourist boards demonstrating the environmental leadership coming out of the region. 

Colin Stewart, Chairman of LATA comments:  “Sustainable travel and eco-tourism are a key focus for Latin American tourist boards and Latin American travel companies, many of which are LATA members, and also pioneers in the field. The introduction of the LATA Sustainability Charter highlights our dedication to protecting the environment and to showcase the environmental leadership coming out of Latin America. LATA will continue to inspire its members to adopt 'green' measures in order to raise awareness of sustainable travel and encourage companies to adopt an eco-approach to travel”.

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Editorial notes:

The Latin American Travel Industry (LATA) is represented by LOTUS. For more information a/o images, please contact Kate McWilliams or Lucy Keenan (latapr@wearelotus.co.uk / 0207 953 7470). For more information on LATA, please visit www.lata.travel