Travel sans guilt? See the ‘Developing World’s 10 Best Ethical Destinations’

Certainly where we travelers go, we leave footprints, and where we spend our dollars, we affect economies. However, how much heed we pay varies, depending upon our priorities and even moods. I’ve taken trips in which I’ve considered potential environmental and cultural impacts, but I’ve also embarked on vacations aplenty where my only real goal was R&R and maybe a good meal and margarita.

But I’d like to think that I will be more cognizant of the effects of my travels in the future. I want to be more responsibly minded and would like my tourism dollars to work toward good. So, where to go? To Argentina, apparently.

A project of the San Francisco-based nonprofit Earth Island Institute, Ethical Traveler has just published a list of the “Developing World’s 10 Best Ethical Destinations,” focused on the developing world. Argentina tops the list, followed by Bolivia and Bulgaria. Here are all of the countries (in alphabetical order) that made the Top 10, chosen for their commitments to the environment as well as to human rights and social welfare:

Argentina
Bolivia
Bulgaria
Chile
Costa Rica
Croatia
Estonia
Namibia
Nicaragua
South Africa

Do any of these picks surprise you? Would you have expected to see aother other country on this list? Share your thoughts in the Comments.

— Susan Derby, Special to the Los Angeles Times

[Photo: Magellanic penguin on Martillo Island in the Beagle Channel off Ushuaia, Argentina; Alan Solomon / Chicago Tribune]

Permalink | E-mail | Print | Add to My Trips

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 22, 2008 at 3:09 pm by Susan Derby and is filed under Africa & Middle East, Eco-Travel, Europe, Global, Latin America & Caribbean, News, Tips & Advice, Outdoors & Adventure. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a comment, or trackback from your own site.