Using travel to support conservation and sustainable community development was a new concept in the 1980’s. While working for Costa Rica's National Park Service, Kurt Kutay, now President of Wildland Adventures, witnessed the power of ecotourism to preserve wild places and help local people in rural environments, hence the company was born. The Travelers Conservation Trust (TCT) was established at the same time as its non-profit affiliate programme and is funded by contributions from Wildland Adventures and its travellers. The TCT supports conservation, cultural heritage preservation, and the economic well-being of local communities. Examples of its projects include training local park guides in India, and the construction and management of a community learning centre for students in a remote Quechua village in Peru. A pioneering business leader in ecotourism, Kurt Kutay, was also a founding member of the board of The International Ecotourism Society, the International Galapagos Tour Operators Association, and the Maasai Environmental Resource Coalition. He serves on the Advisory Board of the Adventure Travel Trade Association (ATTA), a global organization working to promote and encourage sustainable and environmentally and culturally sensitive adventure travel practices worldwide.
In addition to TCT, Wildland also supports the non-profit TOFTigers initiative and our travellers to India each contribute $50 for the 10,000 Tigers Campaign which is given to TOFT. The basic premise of the 10,000 Tigers campaign is that legal, responsible, well managed tourism which works to benefit local communities is the best way to help save the forests of India and its tigers.