Eco Travel Foundation
Tourism can create meaningful value for the places people travel to. The Eco Travel Foundation exists to help make that contribution measurable, transparent and credible.
Our first programme
A programme of the Eco Travel Foundation.
Our purpose
We work with tourism and its partners to strengthen the positive impact tourism can have on climate, nature and people, with transparency at the heart of everything we do.
Supporting the landscapes and wildlife that tourism depends upon.
Understanding and reducing tourism's environmental footprint.
Strengthening the local value tourism creates for people and places.
We believe impact should be visible, verifiable and open.
Don't just make an impact claim. Show the work behind it.
What project, intervention or action?
How much was invested?
Where did it happen?
What difference did it make?
Our first programme
Measured. Benchmarked. Improving.
Verified Impact helps tourism businesses measure their environmental performance, understand it in context and demonstrate progress with evidence.
A programme of the Eco Travel Foundation.
An assessment shows what a property measured, how its performance compares, and where that performance is heading.
Verified Impact
2025 / 26
KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa
Safari Lodge
Measured. Benchmarked. Improving.
High
94% of emissions evidenced
Strong
18% below peer median (African lodges)
Baseline established
2025/26 reference year
21.98
kg CO₂e
per guest night
Independently assessed by
ETC Africa
This is an assessment, not a certification. Results apply to FY2025–2026.
About the VI strip
Tourism for good
A guest staying in a remote lodge can help create employment, finance conservation, give wildlife economic value and help keep landscapes intact.
Our job is to help make more of that impact happen, and make it visible.
Reduce emissions and build resilience.
Support wildlife, habitats and ecosystems.
Strengthen local livelihoods and wellbeing.
Build skills, share learning and drive improvement.
Some of these areas are developing Foundation ambitions rather than fully operational programmes.
Insights & news
Knowledge Series
A monthly online session sharing what operational carbon data from participating tourism properties is actually telling us: what is working, what is not, and where the practical levers sit.
30 June 2026 · Duncan Pritchard
Read article
Responsible Travel
Eight practical things travellers rarely think to do, drawn from work with South African tourism properties measuring and managing their operational emissions.
31 May 2026 · Duncan Pritchard
Read article
Project News
A kimkim-funded pilot worked with 25 South African tourism properties to establish baseline carbon footprints, benchmark them in context and build in-house capacity.
14 April 2026 · Duncan Pritchard
Read articleBuilt through partnership
Technical Assessment & Benchmarking Partner
ETC Africa undertakes the technical carbon footprint assessments, evidence review and African tourism benchmarking supporting Verified Impact.
Founding Project Partner
Tourism industry partner supporting the development and implementation of Verified Impact.
Founding Funding Partner
Initial funding helped establish the programme, participating property baselines and the foundations from which Verified Impact is developing.
Conservation & Impact Partner
Partner connecting the initiative with conservation, wilderness leadership and broader tourism-for-good outcomes.
Verified Impact is a programme of the Eco Travel Foundation.