From tourism to volunteerism
Like AiP’s programs, a new experiment in the Faroe Islands shows the power of sustainable tourism and travel-with-purpose initiatives.
This past April, the Faroe Islands welcomed 100 volunteers from around the world to help repair and future-proof some of its most popular tourist spots, according to a report by the World Economic Forum (WEF).
The experiment is part of a new initiative by the government of the Faroe Islands, a mountainous archipelago sitting in the North Atlantic ocean between Scotland and Iceland, to counter over-tourism. Around 110,000 visitors each year travel to the Faroe Islands, a place that counts less than 50,000 residents. “In a place where inhabitants are outnumbered by their sheep, that’s a fair number of people,” writes the Charlotte Edmond of WEF. “And the fragile environment is starting to see the effects.”
The campaign, titled “closed for business, open for voluntourism,” was announced in February and attracted an unexpected number of applications. Volunteers to the program, which the government hopes to repeat next year, also got to sample local food and drink and take part in traditional dancing.
Initiatives like the one launched by the Faroe Islands might be unique in the fact that it’s run by a government. But it’s not the first time that volunteerism — or voluntourism as the Faroe Islands calls it — enters the world of tourism.
At Adventures in Preservation (AiP) our goal is exactly that: make tourism more sustainable while contribute to local communities and the environment.
Every year, our volunteers — or Jammers — travel to places like Scotland and Armenia, or Montana and Virginia, to help with historic building preservation projects.
Their help and their joy in volunteering with AiP show how sustainable tourism and travel-with-purpose initiatives can create better travel experiences and help communities around the world.
According to WEF, in 2017, tourism contributed $8.2 trillion to the global economy. “It creates a huge number of jobs, and enables economic growth and development across the globe,” the WEF said. “And the industry is predicted to keep on growing.”
But the WEF warns that “over-tourism is a problem for the world’s top sites” and “many cities are now struggling under the mass of visitors.”
If you’re interested in programs like the one launched by the Faroe Islands, consider joining AiP’s adventures and volunteer programs around the world or in the US.
