Club Med has joined hands with Mandai X, the growth and impact venture-building arm of Singapore’s Mandai Wildlife Group, to bring the Ranger Buddies programme to Club Med Bintan from November 16, 2024 to January 5, 2025.
The programme features a series of missions and activities that blend augmented reality with real-life exploration to nurture the next generation of conservation heroes.
Designed with children and families in mind, the Ranger Buddies Missions make learning about sustainability a fun and engaging part of their holiday experience while encouraging participants to care for the planet.
Families and children can embark on a mission to help Coco the tortoise save the threatened habitats of her ocean cousins. Guests can tackle various missions through the Mini Club Med+ programme, enjoy dedicated family activities, or explore the Magic Valley app, a digital storytelling app where children have fun with interactive and personalised stories.
The programme integrates the C.O.U.R.A.G.E. framework, a research-backed approach designed by pedagogical experts – the framework helps children thrive by fostering essential life skills such as creativity, courage, and cooperation.
Participants can also join Club Med’s Amazing Family programme, which offers curated family activities designed to strengthen bonds while learning about sustainability.
In addition, children can become Ranger Buddies certified by Mandai X, and families can take home a personalised digital story about sea turtles to preserve memories of their adventure.
For more information, visit Club Med Bintan.
Her hospitality career has included postings at numerous luxury hotels and resorts around the world, including in North America, Asia, the Middle East and Europe.
He joins the new resort from Courtyard by Marriott Bangkok where he served as general manager.
Thailand-based DMC Tripseed has launched the first phase of its Economic Distribution Disclosure Initiative, a project that aims to map and label the economic benefit distribution of its Thailand operations.
To date, over 80 day tours and half-day tours have been labelled on the Tripseed website, identifying where the economic benefit from each tour goes geographically.
This initiative is said to be the first in the touring industry.
Tripseed defines economic leakage as the phenomenon where money spent by tourists does not remain in the local economy, but instead flows out to other regions or countries. This often occurs when tourism-related businesses are owned by foreign entities and individuals, or when goods and services are imported rather than sourced locally.
Measuring and reporting on leakage transparently is crucial to creating a more sustainable and positively impactful tourism industry. By addressing these imbalances, the tourism sector can lead efforts to create fairer economic opportunities, ensuring that tourism benefits genuinely reach locals.
Reducing leakage benefits destinations by ensuring more revenue remains within destinations and local communities, and goes hand-in-hand with ethical tax conduct towards fostering sustainable development and providing funds for improving public services and infrastructure.
Tripseed’s methodology for calculating leakage reveals insights into revenue distribution. This first phase introduces a labelling system that highlights the geographical beneficiaries of touring activities. Secondary and tertiary phases will disclose further details about the genuine economic beneficiaries of tours, while a complete company-wide disclosure will detail how much of Tripseed’s cost base goes toward local individuals and businesses versus leaks overseas to foreign-owned businesses and multinational corporations.
Ewan Cluckie, co-founder and director of growth at Tripseed, said: “We ensure that all our revenue and profits attributable to Thailand products and services are recorded in Thailand, where we also pay our taxes. Although this might appear minor, profit shifting to foreign countries is a significant issue in the DMC sector, diverting essential income away from local economies. This practice often prioritises maximising profitability over truly investing in the sustainable development of the destinations where they operate.”
“By refining our methodology, we strive to uncover genuine socio-economic contributions to local communities and foster a tourism model prioritising ethical practices over profits.”