08-07-2025
Hawaii Defining Regenerative Travel, Skipping Greenwashing
Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources.
The eco-friendly buzzwords used to be responsible travel, then sustainable travel. Now, it's regenerative travel. Panelists at Newsweek's New Destinations travel summit in London last week debated whether these terms are just buzzwords (greenwashing) or if they are actionable, long-term endeavors.
"The challenge for me is that regenerative is just the current buzzword. So regenerative used to be sustainable. Sustainable used to be responsible, and it's the current generation's way of making us feel good about ourselves in the doing of the work that we're trying to do," Dr. Aaron Salā, CEO of the Hawai'i Visitors and Convention Bureau, told the assembled crowd of over 120 guests.
Salā was joined on the panel by Lyn Hughes, founding editor of Wanderlust magazine, and Xavier Font, professor at the University of Surrey and editor-in-chief of the Journal of Sustainable Tourism.
"Hawaii has a regenerative tourism statute, that tourism itself in Hawaii must be regenerative in nature. The statute, however, does not define regenerative. And so we have this challenge and responsibility to look at this rather complex and dynamic terminology," Salā continued. What Hawaii aims to avoid is greenwashing.
People gather along Kaanapali Beach on August 5, 2024 near Lahaina, Hawaii.
People gather along Kaanapali Beach on August 5, 2024 near Lahaina, Hawaii."There's a term we are familiar with, greenwashing, essentially exaggerating the claims of sustainability that you may make. And we all make those exaggerations on a regular basis, and governments are trying to regulate those more and more," Font told Newsweek's audience.
Font also cautions against green hushing. "Green hushing is a term that you can use for speaking quietly about green practice for fear that both consumers and stakeholders will think that you are a less competent company because you're putting too much emphasis on your green practices and [that] you kind of lost focus on what really is important, which is the business," he said.
The professor continued: "And we see that the same companies, quite often, are doing both things. But we also see a lot of practices around green hushing from small businesses, because very often they don't know how to talk about sustainability, and they haven't learned how to communicate in a persuasive way, or they end up communicating sustainability to consumers in the same way they would have communicated to their environmental auditor if they happen to have one."
Hawaii doesn't plan to greenwash or green hush.
"I come from a native Hawaiian perspective, an island worldview, ultimately, is the entire ecosystem. It's not just the one thing, it's not just the baggage, it's not just the check in. It is how the entire ecosystem comes together. And that entire ecosystem must be regenerative that is genealogically linked, that is understanding the trials and tribulations of the past, how we make the past better usage of innovative technology," Salā said.
"Ultimately, regenerative for us has to be in the firmament, in the DNA of the doing of the industry. So that regenerative doesn't only create an opportunity for advantageous effect on the visitor, it must also create sustainable effect on the environment and the community that that that stands in the foundation of the industry," he continued.
