South African cities among top destinations with the most eco-friendly hotels

The study, undertaken by energy experts at Uswitch, looked at the environmental credentials of thousands of hotels on Booking.com in the world’s 200 major cities and used the holiday site’s ’sustainable’ filter to see how many eco-friendly hotels were accessible in each location.

A percentage score was calculated by comparing this to the total number of hotels listed.

Sitting among a list of popular tourist attractions, celebrity hot spots like Vancouver in Canada which ranked in the top positions, South African cities made a splash, taking up three positions. Ekurhuleni came in ninth, Johannesburg 10th and Cape Town 17th.

In recent years, green initiatives such as the #StopSucking movement urged people to say no to straws and zero waste initiatives spread across the globe in a bid to lessen our carbon footprints. This form of environmental awareness has spilt over into the tourism industry too.

This is the year going green encompasses travel too. Zero waste travel means, strategic and sustainable packing, travelling, eating and hotel-ing.

An online article by Elle.com shared that people can expect to see new travel start-ups and individual enterprises committed to pioneering a more eco-friendly future for our planet in 2022. Searches for zero waste travel are up by 74% on Pinterest.

The main push behind this sort of travel is the rise of Gen Z. This Earth-loving group is aware that the future of our planet is in their hands. While Covid-19 has caused many would-be jet-setters to postpone their vacation plans, the industry’s return is eagerly awaited by this group. After the easing of travel restrictions, these youngsters will play a vital part in reviving the tourism and hospitality industries.

As Gen Z begins moving into a position of having economic pull, businesses are starting to realise the influence they have when it comes to deciding what is trendy and, currently, going green is at the top of the list.

  • Vancouver takes the top spot with nearly 44% of all the hotels in the Canadian city being sustainable.
  • Four of the top five best locations are in Canada – after Vancouver, Toronto is third, Calgary fourth and Edmonton fifth.
  • Sweden’s Stockholm is second on the list with over 40% of its hotels being eco-friendly.
  • Other holiday spots to make the top 20 list include South Africa, Colombia, Germany and Morocco, but the UK doesn’t feature.