Green Issues How Green is your Cactus?

It’s difficult to know where to start when it comes to discussing the green credentials of a company which is entwined in the travel industry. Can we ever be classed as “green”, or “environmentally friendly”?

The fact of the matter is that flying across the world for whatever the pursuit is arguably the single most damaging thing you can do for the planet, and a whole year of effort recycling glass bottles and newspapers will pale desperately into insignificance by the shortest of flights. The greenhouse gas CO2 is one of the most harmful, and emissions of CO2 through flying is set to be the largest contributor to global warming just a few years from now.

How then, can we at Cactus take a green stance if we are indirectly promoting the use of air travel in the pursuit of overseas language learning, teaching English abroad, and cross-cultural enlightenment?

Well despite all that we set out to achieve, we are big believers in trying to minimise the impact we have on the environment.

GREEN PLAN IT

In our market-led economy, we’re all drawn by cheap prices, and the attraction of low cost air travel is no exception. Your decision to take a 4-week TEFL course in Budapest because the course is cheap only becomes viable because the flight is at a ‘budget’ price. The offer is there though, and while ever it’s there, are we, as mere consumers, to be blamed if we take up that offer? That depends on how environmentally aware you are, and how much your conscience is pricked by the fact you’re travelling by air. Most people won’t give it a second thought if it means them fulfilling a desire to do something.

We would urge you though, at the planning stage of your project to “do TEFL and travel the world” to see if there are any ways of you minimising your use of air travel.

Where you do your TEFL Course

Do you really need to go overseas to do the course, if you’re going to be flying back just 4 weeks later? The leading courses, such as the CELTA and CertTESOL are pretty much the same wherever you take them. Check out the locations we have close to your home. By the time you’ve added up travel costs to and from the airport, flights, local transfers, accommodation, food and drink and other expenses, will it really be cheaper to go abroad? If not, benefit from the familiarity of your surroundings and get friends and family to look after you whilst you’re working hard on the course.

Where do you want to work when you’ve finished the course?

If you’re planning to work overseas teaching English straight after the course, then it does make sense to take the course in the location you’re hoping to teach in. Increasingly, we’re asking our partner schools around the world to provide employment support. Throughout 2007, there will be more and more Course + Job options, where you can travel to one place to qualify and then stay on to teach there. This obviously cuts down on your flying, and the longer you stay in one place, the more you help reduce your personal impact - your carbon footprint.

GREEN FOR GO

When you read of old-style voyages, the journey was every bit as exciting as the ‘getting there’. With the advent of rapid “get there quick” travel (and mp3 players!), much of the encounters, experiences and conversations along the way have disappeared, and turned travel into a very sterile experience. Remember with Cactus you’re travelling abroad in search of new cultures and civilisations, and better international understanding. What better way to get the process started than to travel in a way that exposes you to other people?

Coach Travel

It may work out cheaper, not to mention be a more social experience if you use other means of transport. Eurolines (http://www.eurolines.com) now have brilliant Europe-wide coverage at excellent prices and bus travel is substantially more green than flying. You can take heavier bags too, which can be helpful if you’re setting up home overseas. The journey time is longer, but there’s no faffing about at airports (or getting to them), and coach travel really gives you a sense of voyage, and a good sense of the scale and landscape of a country.

Train & Ship

You can, of course travel by train and ship, both for short and long-haul destinations. If you want adventure, you can retrace some of the greatest voyages of the world by sticking to the land and sea. Check out the brilliant Seat Sixty-One site www.seat61.com for more inspiration.

Car share

Another solution is to team up and go together by car with a bunch of friends. If you’re filling a car with 4 people, then you’re actually being quite environmental! It also means that you can share driving and you’ll probably have a few laughs en route. You can also tap into the various car share projects and meet likeminded people along the way. See http://freewheelers.co.uk/about.php or http://www.nationalcarshare.co.uk/.

OFFSETTING YOUR EMISSIONS

We would argue that this is a sort of partial solution. The idea is that various organisations such as Climate Care http://www.climatecare.org will calculate your CO2 emissions, and come up with a financial value for them. The money you give is then used in projects which will aim to offset your CO2. Whilst some organisations concentrate on offsetting through planting trees, it is considered better to offset through funding green energy projects that reduce the use of fossil fuels.

It is definitely a great thing to do, and we at Cactus offset any flights we undertake. However this has to be done in the right spirit. The problem is that many of the projects will not absorb the CO2 you generate today, but will do so over duration of the project. This is still substantially better than not off-setting, but some environmentalists argue that it will be too late by then.

So offset yes, but don’t use it as an excuse to fly more often or recklessly, we say.

GREEN LIVING

If you’ve managed to get there in an environmentally friendly way, that’s the major hurdle behind you. When living in your chosen location, the chances are you’ll lead a much greener lifestyle than at home. More often than not, TEFLers will be heavily reliant on public transport and a bike to get around. So much so that a year of not commuting and not driving anywhere can give you an enviably green carbon footprint. To top this, try and increase your integration by shopping at local growers’ markets (where these exist) and take an interest in local life. Teachers often stay with local host families and in privately rented apartments. These all put good money into the local economy and are the antithesis of international hotels that most mainstream holidaymakers are squeezed into. These tend to guzzle resources such as water and power, have food flown in from around the world and often pay very low wages.

SO HOW GREEN IS YOUR CACTUS?

Well we do our bit here in our Brighton offices, whether it be recycling our paper, switching off lights or cycling to work, and offsetting our carbon emissions.

But YOU are our best hope of changing the world for the better. You can make all the difference. We encourage you to explore, learn, and have amazing, life-changing experiences, but at the same time we ask you to do it in an environmentally conscious way.

Thanks in advance.

Useful information sources:

Climate Care
http://www.climatecare.org
Airport Watch
http://www.rethink.airportwatch.org.uk
Friends of the Earth
http://www.foe.co.uk
Greenpeace
http://www.greenpeace.org.uk
WWF
http://www.wwf.org.uk/core/index.asp