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news travel gives back
ttglive.com
Sesame Street character Abby Cadabby hugs Jamaican PM Bruce Golding during the Sandals Foundation launch
Travel gives back:
Aid local causes,
Five Sandals projects
Sesame Street tie-up
Sandals has an arrangement with the com-
urges Jamaica PM
pany behind Sesame Street that allows char-
acters from the TV show to visit Jamaican
schools to talk about environmental issues
such as beach clean-ups and social problems
such as HIV. Sesame Street also helped
Chris Gray.
Sandals has funded 300 community projects Sandals collect 17,000 books for schools.
THE JAMAICAN prime minister has called on from its own coffers for many years, but the
travel companies to follow Sandals’ lead in foundation, which was first unveiled at WTM last Hospitality training programme
helping local communities. year, allows customers to contribute directly for A programme with the Jamaican Heart
He wants other firms to set up foundations the first time. Academy where young people from deprived
to get customers involved in helping troubled Chief executive Adam Stewart said Sandals areas are trained in different roles at a resort.
communities near tourist destinations. wanted UK agents to talk to customers about his Many of them get jobs at Sandals resorts, or
Bruce Golding was speaking at the launch project when they booked so they were aware of are helped to find jobs in other companies.
of the Sandals Foundation in Jamaica, at which it beforehand.
the charity presented a cheque for nearly Stewart said guests would be made aware The Whitehouse school
£4,000 to a Peace and Justice centre it set up in of the foundation in resort – but not in an Working with the Canadian Yellowbird
a deprived part of Montego Bay. overbearing manner. Foundation to build a school near Sandals’
He told an audience of 220 people from Resort staff will wear Foundation T-shirts one Whitehouse resort on the south coast of
tourism and business that the Sandals Founda- day a week with the aim of sparking enquiries Jamaica, where children now have to use
tion would help tackle crime and violence in and donations from guests. shipping containers as classrooms. The
Jamaica by reaching communities that had school aims to be the first in the world to get
become alienated from mainstream society. ■ Read about the fund: sandalsfoundation.org a Green Globe environmental certification.
Buying from local farmers
Sandals resorts
the Sandals brand was holding up well. The Training local farmers in growing vegetables
family-orientated Beaches brand has seen a fall in demand in resorts such as zucchinis. The
are ‘bullet-proof’
in sales but the group as a whole was maintain- hotels benefit because they get a consistent
ing its position, he said. year-round product, and the farmers benefit
“We’re pretty much the only ones as Sandals guarantees to buy crops.
THE CHIEF EXECUTIVE of Sandals has doing business. Lots of hotels have
hailed the company’s resorts as “bullet- low occupancies. We’ve had great Marine sanctuaries
proof”, despite predicting the financial occupancies, in the mid-80s. Sandals aims to designate the immediate
downturn will affect the Caribbean for at “We’ve had to do more promo- coastline outside its resorts as marine sanc-
least the next two years. tions than before, people expect tuaries where fishermen agree not to fish
Adam Stewart (pictured) said more value. But our product is between the beach and the reef, preserving
America’s financial problems would comprehensive, our brand is fish stocks and improving the environment.
continue to affect the Caribbean but that bulletproof,” Stewart added.
12 27.03.2009
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