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The effect on communities of “adventure” travel

There's no stopping some people. They're not happy unless they spend a couple of weeks visiting a far-flung place that no one else has heard of, let alone been to. But is adventure travel friend or foe to the largely undiscovered corners of the planet?

It's tempting to think you are helping a remote community by canoeing down its rivers or doing a sponsored hike across its mountains but eco-tourism is really just a holiday unless you can demonstrate that your presence and activities have a positive impact on local life. Research on holiday destinations is also crucial to avoid lining the pockets of unscrupulous governments dazzled by the potential for big tourism bucks.

Tourism can change a region forever, and seldom for the better. The charity Survival International makes the point that Himalayan fields lie uncultivated because the men who once farmed them, and consequently provided food for the region, have become porters on climbing expeditions. Research is key. Before you sign up, you need to make sure the company you're going with has watertight ecological and social credentials. What is the likely impact of the trip on the local environment? Will the money you raise benefit that environment?

This year, Bianca Jagger and Survival International began a campaign against governments who have ignored the only piece of international law concerned with protecting the rights of indigenous and tribal peoples. The International Labour Organisation Convention 169 recognises that tribal peoples have ownership rights over their lands. This is crucial for their survival, yet in many areas tribes are being evicted from their lands which are taken over for mining, oil exploration, ranching, dams or tourism.

Survival International is asking people not to go on holiday to Botswana until the local Bushmen are allowed to return to their land in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve and to hunt and gather freely. The Gana and Gwi say that tourism should not be developed on their land until they can go home. But the government is promoting the reserve as a tourist attraction. Other key tourist destinations, such as the Tsodilo Hills, famous for ancient Bushman rock art, have also been emptied of the Bushmen who used to live there. Cynically, the Botswana government uses the Bushmen's hunter-gatherer way of life to promote the country to tourists. In fact, the Gana and Gwi were banned from hunting and gathering on their land in 2002, and Bushmen hunting to feed their families now face heavy fines or imprisonment. Bushman hunters have also been tortured if suspected of hunting.

Survival's director Stephen Corry explains: 'The Gana and Gwi are fighting for their very survival, languishing in eviction sites where they are falling victim to alcoholism, prostitution and HIV/AIDS. Please don't go on holiday to Botswana until they are allowed to go home, and write to the president to ask him to let this happen now.'

It's hardly likely that any of that would appear in a holiday brochure. And yet people might easily book a trip to the region thinking the revenue they are generating is building a better life for the locals.

Land of the free?

Just a stone's throw from America, more than 100,000 people work in Cuba's tourism industry but earlier this year they were ordered by Fidel Castro's regime to restrict contact with foreigners to an absolute minimum. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 and the ending of Soviet subsidies to Cuba, the Castro regime called tourism 'a necessary evil', regarding it as a vital source of foreign currency, but also a corrupting, capitalist influence on society. Cubans must now seek official written permission from their Communist government to attend meals or functions with foreigners. They must declare any personal gifts or tips from tourists, and workers have been told to report foreign employers if they witness any actions that might threaten the regime.

Meanwhile, Cambodia's Angkor Wat - the largest religious monument in the world - has less protection than our own Stonehenge. At certain times of the day, some tourists decide to scramble across the ruins without regard for the damage they cause. Lara Croft was never so disrespectful. Proper security for Angkor was one of the conditions set by Unesco when it listed the area as a world heritage site in 1992 but it is hard to reverse 20 years of war, decay, landmine damage and endless looting. Tourist numbers have grown from 40,000 in 1998 to 171,000 in 2004. But with the visitors come the hot-dog stands and now the local cab drivers are complaining that they will be unemployed when a new electric shuttle is built.

If you really want to make a difference there is plenty of choice. For instance, Sunvil Africa and Robin Pope Safaris arranges visits to Kawaza village, Zambia as part of a tailor-made itinerary and donates its commission to the village's school fund. Sunvil also donates £50 for each booking to the Southern Africa Crisis Appeal, while Robin Pope Safaris contributes £20 per person, per day to Zambian famine relief programmes (though the rains have fallen normally this year). All this means, for example, that a seven-night holiday will contribute £380 towards food aid. This sum, the World Food Programme estimates, will feed 28 families for a month. Sunvil Africa: 020-8232 9777.

Alternatively, spend your holiday nights on a Costa Rican beach helping scientists to monitor near-extinct leatherback turtles. This hands-on conservation work is one of more than 100 scientific projects organised worldwide by the Earthwatch Institute. Volunteers pay towards the cost of the project (and their own flights) and work as expedition members under the direction of the scientists: no qualifications are needed. Earthwatch: 01865 318838.