Our wildlife campaign has been awarded the People’s Choice Award at the World Responsible Tourism Awards
News
Thank you to everyone who voted for us to be awarded the Responsible Tourism People’s Choice award at the World Travel Market exhibition.
We won the award based on our recent campaign work to protect wild animals from cruel tourist entertainment attractions. We are working collaboratively with the travel industry to free these elephants from a life of misery, and can also prevent the same tragic fate happening to more elephants, stopping the cycle of abuse. So far 83 travel companies have joined with us and have committed to end the sale of elephant rides and shows around the world.
We know that many tourists visit these wildlife attractions because they love animals and many are completely unaware of the suffering that occurs behind the scenes at cruel venues. Our campaign reveals this cruelty so people can make informed choices and become repsonsible tourists.
“One of the main aims of the Responsible Tourism Awards is to inspire tourists by what is possible to achieve through responsible tourism,” the Awards state. “This Award reveals which the travelling public find the most inspirational.”
On our campaign the awards organisers added, “With this Award, World Animal Protection show they have won over the people who can really create change, and that we can all be compassionate in travel.”
In association with National Geographic Traveller magazine, the People’s Choice Award is the only category in which nominees are voted by the public. This is especially meaningful to us as our supporters have been a central part of our Wildlife. Not entertainers campaign. We wouldn’t have been able to move 83 travel companies to sign our Elephant-friendly travel pledge without their support.
Recently an amazing 140,128 people signed our petition to tell Thomas Cook, one of the world’s largest travel companies, to stop selling elephant rides and shows. We delivered the petition to Thomas Cook’s global headquarters in London last week.
Now in their 12th year, the World Responsible Tourism Awards were founded by Responsible Travel in 2004 to celebrate the most inspiring stories in responsible tourism. We hope to be nominated again in 2016 – thank you to those who voted for us, and for those who continue to help us move the world to protect animals.
“With this Award, World Animal Protection show they have won over the people who can really create change, and that we can all be compassionate in travel.