7 minute read
Air, Land and Sea: The Wider Role of The Hotelier
David Leventhal, co-founder of Playa Viva, has been an inspiration to the Network from the start. He spoke this year about achieving B-Corp certification and is now inspired by his project to regenerate the entire watershed around his resort, from river to ocean. But when it comes to offsetting flights, he believes bigger impacts can be made closer to home.
SONU SHIVDASANI TALKED RECENTLY ABOUT HOW HE IS CONCENTRATING NOW ON HOW TO TACKLE THE FOOTPRINT OF THE GUESTS TRAVELING TO HIS RESORTS? WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS?
This is a “soapbox” issue for me, you might regret having asked. It’s easy to just “flight shame” and say, “How can Play Viva, or any of one of these regenerative resorts be sustainable if people have to fly to them?”
But this question is NOT focusing on the underlying problem. Paul Hawkin wrote a book called ‘Drawdown’, in which he lists the top 100 things we can do to “draw down” the carbon in the atmosphere. Based on flight shaming, you would think air travel would be in the top 10. It is not and it’s not in the top 20 either, it’s not even in the top 50. I believe it’s like 74 or 75. The top 10 items include air conditioning, educating women and girls and issues related to food and agriculture, such as eating a plant-based diet, deforestation, food waste and more.
So rather than focus on carbon offsetting your flight and flight shaming, let’s focus on the top 10, top 20, top 50 first! When a guest comes to Playa Viva, there’s no air conditioning, they enjoy locally sourced farm-to-table food and all of our food waste feeds the pigs on our farm and that’s just the start. We are 100% off-grid solar, reforesting the ecosystem, planting mangroves, cleaning up the water quality and working in the community on educating women and girls and keeping them in school longer. If you’re traveling to a hotel, and you’re offsetting your carbon, yet your hotel is serving meat flown in from Argentina, wine imported from France, powered by dirty fossil fuels, filling the local landfills with waste, etc., then who cares about off-setting your flights to get to your hotel. Bottomline, let’s focus on the most impactful items first.
Sonu is definitely a leader in the field and an OG to many of us and someone that I follow for inspiration, but from our personal perspective, I look at Drawdown and Paul Hawkins for inspiration related to the issue of travel vs other areas of making a real impact to draw down the carbon in our atmosphere.
WHO WOULD YOU LIKE TO HEAR SPEAK AT A FUTURE EVENT?
I always really enjoy hearing Bill Bensley and respect his ability to stay true to his design style while integrating sustainable innovations. Robyn Woodhead and the work that she does as well in support of Antarctica. To hear from more innovators like them would be wonderful.
WHAT DID YOU TAKE AWAY FROM OUR MONTENEGRO EVENT AS A RESULT OF SPENDING TIME WITH OUR DELEGATES?
I really enjoy being able to develop deep relationships with fellow attendees and interact with all different types of peers, not just hotels but even designers, suppliers and especially those who are developing new properties. I would love to see more aspiring hoteliers who are developing innovative and interesting projects. I hate to say it but it might be interesting to add a “shark tank” like event where you get a couple of, hate to say this too, “old timers” like us with established hotels, experienced designers and suppliers, and provide real-time feedback to those entrepreneurs. Opinions are worth what you pay for them, but hopefully a fun and interesting interaction for all participants, plus it’s part of our role as “elders” to pay it forward.
WHAT IS INSPIRING YOU RIGHT NOW - DO YOU HAVE A BOOK/PODCAST OR OTHER RECOMMENDATION FOR US?
What’s inspiring me most right now is the work that we’re doing in the watershed - ReSiMar, Regenerating from Sierra to Mar. Through that project, we are looking at not just the 200 acres and the mile of beach where Playa Viva is based but also the entire watershed ecosystem which we are a part. Because what happens up the watershed and in the Juluchuca River impacts us directly. The river flows to the ocean, hits the dunes and backs up forming an estuary. That estuary flows through our property. So if what is happening up the estuary is unhealthy and pesticides and garbage are going into the river, then that impacts us at the hotel. Our role really extends all the way up to the headwaters of the Juluchuca River.
ReSiMar is focused on five nodes: Education, Marine Life, Permaculture, Water and Reforestation. Each one of those nodes has subnodes, for example, Marine Life has projects covering sustainable fisheries, mangrove regeneration, and the turtle sanctuary. All this work is being led by a group of young, female environmental and community impact leaders supported by Playa Viva.
One of them, for example, who we’re really proud of is Ximena who has been with us for two years now. She’s working with an expert in Mexico, who leads education development across the country, as her advisor. Together they have developed a bespoke regenerative education curriculum that looks at cultural appreciation, environmental education, and English speaking abilities. The curriculum has been recognized as an innovative case study by Harvard University.
In terms of books, I just finished Overstory, which is a beautiful, poetic story. It was long and hard to finish but a wonderfully, intertwined story about nature, activism and resistance. Reminding us that we need the Earth, the Earth doesn’t need us.
WHAT ARE YOUR HOPES FOR PLAYA VIVA IN 2024?
For 2024, I am really looking forward to kicking into gear with our social impact work - ReSiMar. I am inspired by how that team is developing. 2024 will be the first year for a while that we don’t have any new rooms or areas being developed at the hotel, so I am looking forward to taking the opportunity to ‘tending to the soil’ so to speak and making it much richer rather than adding anything new.
YOU SPOKE TO US ABOUT B CORP ACCREDITATION EARLIER THIS YEAR - HOW IS THE PROCESS ONGOING?
We achieved our B-Corp certification in January 2023, coming out with the highest score awarded to any hotel prior to that date. The thing about B-Corp is it isn’t a quest for perfection it is a quest for continual improvement. As soon as we were certified we started working on our recertification in 3-years. B-Corp is currently redesigning its evaluation process so the goalposts are constantly moving and keeping us on our toes. We spent a lot of time reviewing our score and looking for improvement areas, so right now we are working on putting the processes in place to ensure we can prove continual improvement over the upcoming years.
A big task is simply getting the whole team engaged with tracking the data we need so that when it comes to recertifying it won’t take a full year, everything will be ready. I’m really proud of how our team is engaging with B-Corp and constantly reminding each other of what we need to track and improve. Going through the certification process has created a higher level of awareness on how to be more impactful among our entire team.
