Back packs or suitcases? If travelling on one of our leisure tours then you choose, either is acceptable, if travelling on an adventure tour a back pack is best as is most travel in Borneo. It is easier to climb on and off boats with a back pack. Remember you are bound to do some shopping so leave plenty of room. Irene
RESPONSIBLE TRAVEL
Responsible Travel is something we hear a lot about these days as people try to minimise their footprint on the world or travel in a way that benefits rather than harms the local communities they are visiting.
On most of our tour pages you will see ways in which your choice to travel with the Active Travel company benefits the communities and environments that we operate in.
We are also proud to be associated with a number of local initiatives organised directly ourselves or with our Partners.
BORNEOS LOST TRIBE: THE PENAN
Borneo's Penan tribe know little about their history as they have wandered the jungle for generations. In their language there are forty words for sago palm, and no words for goodbye, thank you or thief. The Penan are a nomadic people who view the entire rainforest as their home. They are an "eco-village" on the move, one with a history many thousands of years old. The rainforest is their library, their hospital, their supermarket, spiritual and actual homes.
The Problem
The nomadic hunter-gatherer Penan are one of the last such groups in South East Asia. Out of the 10,000 Penan living in the Malaysian state of Sarawak, Borneo, only 200 truely nomadic people are left. These small groups of nomads move through a land of dense forest, narrow steep-sided valleys and fast flowing streams in the north-east of the state. Penan material culture is changing (western clothing is dominant, everyone has plastic tarpaulins), but the nomads still rely on the forest to provide most of what they need, from blowpipes to flour.
Being the last nomadic hunter-gatherers of Borneo, the Penan have been hit by logging operations. Although many had already engaged in agriculture and settled with varying degrees of permanency by then, they still depend heavily on forest resources. Most Penan children have been through schooling and it is unlikely that they or their parents would wish to return to their nomadic lifestyle. However they are still Malaysia's poorest inhabitants and the infrastructure for modern living has yet to reach them.
The Solution
The Active Travel Company has provided practical support to one of the largest Penan settled communities for several years by sponsoring projects at their longhouse and offering travellers the opportunity to visit the community. The benefits are for both the visitor and the local people, for us it is an opportunity to relate first hand with them, to learn the wonders of the rain forest, their medicines, foods and their spirituality. They delight in teaching us their ways and it helps keep their traditions alive and instills a pride and value into the younger generation. The projects we have so far sponsored is a clean water system giving each family their own source of tap water from a clear stream, we are currently working on fire extinguishers and first aid training.
HOW YOU CAN HELP
If travelling to Borneo and visiting this community, part of your tour fare goes directly to the projects. You are always welcome to donate extra funds to the project and English books, clothes, pencils and pens are always welcome as extras. If you are unable to take part in the tour one of our guides will make sure any donations go direct to community projects without any middle men.
SOS - SAVE OUR SAUSAGE TREES - BOTSWANA:
The MOKORO is the traditional means of transport for the people of the Okavango Delta in Botswana. For the adventure seeker, gliding through the Okavango Delta in a mokoro with a local guide, is the essence of the Okavango experience. Slipping silently through the water as you explore the maze of shallow waterways watching out for wildlife and marveling at the birdlife.
The Problem
But behind this serene experience there lies a disturbing environmental impact. With the increase in tourism to Botswana over the last 20 years the number of mekoro polers earning a living from tourism has increased. This has been beneficial to the communities living within the Okavango Delta and by 2009 there are estimated to be over 2000 mokoros in the Okavango region. Each mokoro is cut from a single mature Kigelia Africana tree (Sausage Tree).
The root of the problem is that a wooden mekoro lasts perhaps only 5 years before it rots and falls apart. Therefore to build new mekoro, roughly 400 trees must be felled each year and there just aren’t enough trees to sustain this.
The local communities of the Okavango are aware of the problem – largely because they now struggle to find trees big enough for mekoro. Each year we have witnessed smaller new mekoros (meaning younger trees are cut down) and old mekoro being used beyond their reasonable life (meaning leaks and multiple plastic patches).
The community have agreed to stop harvesting trees in the Ditsipi village area and are therefore buying wooden mekoro from other parts of the delta.
The Solution
In the Okavango the number of Sausage Trees cut down each year to build new wooden mekoros is not sustainable. The solution to this environmental issue is to use fiberglass mekoro. Sunway has consulted with the community and they have agreed that should a poler buy a fiberglass mokoro, then the poler will pay 50% of the cost and Sunway the other 50%.
HOW YOU CAN HELP
Sunway Safaris, through their Botswana operating company Planet Okavango, has set up a fund to assist polers to buy fiberglass mekoros and help protect their natural environment. Contact us for more information on how you can help.