Green destinations

With the United Nations putting sustainable tourism firmly on the global agenda, and Muslim countries traditionally struggling in this field, eco-experts are now wondering if it is time to bring religion into the discussion.

Last month at the UN’s Sustainable Development Summit, more than 150 world leaders agreed to adopt an “ambitious new sustainable development agenda” that will affect all areas of policy for the next 15 years, including tourism, and nowhere will this be more difficult to implement than in the Muslim member states.

Recently, when the long list for the 2015 World Travel Responsible Tourism awards were released, only one of the 206 companies included was from the Middle East. Only 6 percent of the companies on the list were from Muslim countries.

“Muslims in general, and those in the Middle East in particular, are not very much into ecotourism,” says Shams Ahsan, managing editor of the Saudi Gazette. “In 2014, 11 Arab League countries met in Algeria to discuss and promote ecotourism. The joint initiative has not fully materialized yet.”

However, 2015 has also seen the first ever International Islamic Climate Change Symposium take place in Istanbul, where the Islamic Declaration on Global Climate Change was launched using verses from the Quran, like the following:

“He raised the heaven and established the balance. So that you would not transgress the balance. Give just weight – do not skimp in the balance. He laid out the earth for all living creatures.” (55:7-10)

MINDSET SHIFT

The symposium and its supporters are part of a growing shift in thinking across the Muslim world.

“The Muslim community has been quite receptive in adopting the “green movement,” because many of the principles, such as eliminating waste, respect for animals and environmental stewardship are inherent to Islamic teachings,” says Muaz Nasir, founder of Khaleafa.com, a website that aims to promote an Islamic approach to environmentalism.

Nasir, who pioneered the Green Khutbah campaign–a Friday “eco-sermon”–believes Muslim countries could do the same to encourage eco-tourism.

“Tourist boards in Muslim nations could stand to really benefit from this if they merge together Islamic teaching with the ecological component.”

Eco-tourism does exist in Muslim countries; in fact, one of the big success stories was the only Muslim representative to make the finals of the prestigious Tourism for Tomorrow awards this year.

Feynan Lodge in Jordan, a finalist in the Community Award category, runs wholly on sustainable power, and their work aims to directly benefit the local community.

Last year 80 percent of the products used at the lodge had been purchased within a 60-kilometer radius, and more than half the money spent there (55 percent) went straight back into the local economy, benefiting a population of 450 Jordanians.  

Furthermore, while tourism figures for Jordan fell between 2012 and 2014, Feynan recorded 28 percent growth.

Nor is Feynan alone, says Matthew Teller, author of “The Rough Guide to Jordan.”

“I have seen lots of examples of eco- and sustainable travel, in countries from Jordan and Lebanon to the UAE and Oman,” says Teller. “A few years ago, I was lucky enough to kayak through the offshore mangrove forests of Abu Dhabi, thanks to a grassroots one-man tourism operation committed to offering a sustainable, environmentally friendly alternative to the UAE's vastly overblown commercial tourism products.”

The problem, in Teller’s view, is education: “Countries where public education on environmental issues is poor might struggle to develop eco-tourism programs.”

Nasir, who sits on the board of several eco-movements in his native Toronto, agrees.

“The success of existing Muslim-driven green initiatives give us hope that the Muslim community can be educated to appreciate eco-tourism is just an extension of that,” he says. “If they embrace this, through Islam, we can educate and inform the Muslim community about the challenges the world faces and raise issues such as deforestation, desertification, species loss and [rising] sea levels.”

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