Sustainable Travel

Conde Nast Traveler today announced the winners of the magazine's 2008 World Savers Awards, honoring travel companies from around the world for their leadership in social
responsibility in five key areas: poverty alleviation, cultural and/or environmental preservation, education, wildlife conservation and health.

"The Conde Nast Traveler World Savers Awards recognize companies that are stepping up to the challenge of improving our world," said Editor-in-Chief Klara Glowczewska. "This year's finalists are setting standards in social responsibility in ways that we hope will become models
for the entire travel industry."

The 2008 World Savers Award Winners are:
- Campi Ya Kanzi (Kenya), for Poverty Alleviation. The solar-powered safari camp is staffed primarily by local tribesmen.
- Cristalino Jungle Lodge (Brazil), for Preservation. This is one of the most biodiverse lodges in the Brazilian Amazon, where owner Vitoria Da Riva
- Carvalho has almost single-handedly saved more than 25,000 acres of threatened rainforest.
- Journeys Within (Cambodia), for Health Initiatives. The tour operator's non-profit arm has added more than 180 water wells to the landscape around Siem Reap, helping nearly 4,000 Cambodians to escape water-related disease. They also offer scholarships for university students, hold free English classes, and provide micro-loans for small businesses in Cambodia.
- Montage Laguna Beach (Laguna Beach, California), for Education. The hotel's employee-driven outreach effort supports marine and language education as well as local arts programs in the local school district.
- Phinda Private Game Reserve (South Africa), for Wildlife Programs. Phinda has implemented an animal restocking program that added more than 2,000 animals to the land. Eighteen years ago, nearly all of the animals on this 57,000 acre reserve had been killed by farmers, ivory hunters, and a misguided government fly-eradication program.
- Vail Resorts (Vail, Colorado), for Preservation. The company offsets all of its electricity usage by supporting the development of wind farms.

The 2008 World Savers Awards are featured in the September issue, which hits newsstands on Tuesday, August 19. World Savers Award finalists will be recognized at an award ceremony on September 23rd at the 2nd Annual Conde Nast Traveler World Savers Congress in New York City.

World Savers Awards Methodology: To determine the award finalists and winners, Conde Nast Traveler editors reviewed 142 applications and narrowed them to 38 finalists. An independent panel of 17 judges, comprised of leaders from the travel industry and non-governmental organizations, rated how applicants exercised social responsibility in 5 key areas: poverty
alleviation, cultural and/or environmental preservation, education, wildlife conservation and health. There were 7 categories of travel company: airlines, cruise lines, hotel chains, individual city hotels, large resorts, small resorts, and tour operators.

Below is a complete list of winners, runners up, honorable mentions and additional finalists. The list is also available online at cntraveler.com/makeadifference.

The 2008 Conde Nast Traveler World Savers Awards:

POVERTY ALLEVIATION
- Winner: Campi Ya Kanzi
- Runner Up: Accor Honorable Mentions: Cathay Pacific, Disney Cruise Line, Journeys
- Within, Phinda Private Game Reserve, Twelve Apostles Hotel and Spa

PRESERVATION
- Co-Winners: Vail Resorts and Cristalino Jungle Lodge
- Honorable Mentions: Disney Cruise Line, Evason Phuket & Six Senses Spa,
- Journeys Within, Montage Laguna Beach, Virgin Atlantic Airways

EDUCATION
- Winner: Montage Laguna Beach
- Runner Up: Banyan Tree Hotels & Resorts
- Honorable Mentions: Abercrombie & Kent, Disney Cruise Line, Lufthansa, Nkwichi Lodge, Phinda Private Game Reserve

WILDLIFE
- Winner: Phinda Private Game Reserve
- Runner Up: Disney Cruise Line
- Honorable Mentions: Banyan Tree, Campi Ya Kanzi, Cathay Pacific, Metropolitan Touring, Montage Laguna Beach

HEALTH
- Winner: Journeys Within
- Runner Up: Air France
- Honorable Mentions: Jai Mahal Palace, Holland America, Nukubati Island
- Great Sea Reef, Phinda Private Game Reserve, Six Senses

ADDITIONAL FINALISTS:
Anantara Resort Golden Triangle, British Airways, Fairmont, Four Seasons Hotels & Resorts, Fregate Island Private, Grand Hyatt Dubai, Micato Safaris, MSC Cruise Line, Nature Air, Norwegian Cruise Line, Puntacana Resort & Club, Regent Seven Seas, Rios Tropicales, Shangri-La's Mactan Resort & Spa, Thomson Safaris, and Willard InterContinental, Washington DC

2008 World Savers Awards Judges:
- Ralf Buckley, Director, Int'l Centre For Ecotourism Research, Griffith University, Australia
- Mark Conroy, President, Regent Seven Seas Cruises
- Louis D'Amore, President, International Institute for Peace Through Tourism
- Laurie David, Natural Resources Defense Council Trustee; Environmental Activist; Producer, An Inconvenient Truth
- Marcia Gay Harden, Environmentalist; Oscar-Winning Actress
- Martha Honey, Director, Center on Ecotourism and Sustainable Development
- Mark Hoplamazian, CEO, Global Hyatt Corp.
- Neel Inamdar, Senior Adviser, Ecotourism, Conservation International
- Sven Lindblad, President and CEO, Lindblad Expeditions
- Ron Mader, Director, Planeta.Com
- James McCarthy, Professor of Biological Oceanography, Harvard University
- Brian Mullis, President, Sustainable Travel International
- Denis Pinto, Managing Director, Micato Safaris
- Sam Raphael, Owner, Jungle Bay, Dominica
- Jean-Cyril Spinetta, CEO, Air France
- Shannon Stowell, President, Adventure Travel Trade Association
- Timothy Wirth, President, UN Foundation

About Conde Nast Traveler
Travel publications often accept free travel and accommodations. Conde Nast Traveler does not, and its correspondents, as far as possible, travel anonymously. They experience travel the way consumers do, both the good and the bad, and report on it fairly and honestly. Conde Nast Traveler has a circulation of over 800,000 and is published by Conde Nast Publications, Inc. Conde Nast Traveler's website is cntraveler.com.