A fair way for golfers

ETHICAL TRAVELLER: FOR SOME PEOPLE golf is the reason for getting up in the morning

ETHICAL TRAVELLER:FOR SOME PEOPLE golf is the reason for getting up in the morning. Most are unaware, however, that golf holidays are one of the most damaging forms of tourism.

There is no sugar-coating it, I’m afraid. In many parts of the world where resorts boast of having 18 heavenly holes, others campaign to stop vast amounts of herbicides, pesticides and contaminated water seeping into the natural environment.

In the Far East, farmers fight for compensation after being displaced in the name of the game.

And then there is the wider water issue. Last year, in Spain and Portugal, water was being shipped in to supply local people while sprinklers were still in action to keep the golfers coming. In Cyprus water is shipped in from Greece, yet construction on 14 golf courses continues. These courses will suck up about 30 million cubic metres of water a year, compared with the population’s drinking-water needs of 85 million cubic metres. The new courses will take supplies from desalination plants, enabling them to use seawater, but this process requires vast amounts of energy, and still fundamentally provides water to tourists before it does to the people who live there.

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And golf tourism is growing. Worldwide it is a €12 billion industry. The International Association of Golf Tour Operators, set up in 1997, now represents more than 1,000 companies. At a recent conference on making golf greener, it was clear that money was its priority, stating that businesses “need economic success first, and can then aim for environmental sustainability”.

Mexico had 50 golf courses 10 years ago; today it has 200. Manuel Diaz Cebrian of the Mexican Tourist Board also talks about the power of the golf dollar. “In Mexico, golf is very elitist, associated with tourism only, not sport,” he says.

In similar emerging and developing countries golf proliferates a form of tourism where tourists are viewed as neocolonialists rather than as welcome guests, creating dissatisfaction locally and even causing social harm.

Some organisations are trying to address these issues. The RA, based in St Andrews, Scotland, is the sport’s international governing body, with an advisory team committed to creating sustainable courses. It promotes the use of grass turf suitable to the local climate, water conservation, and limited use of chemicals. Although the scheme is still in its embryonic stage, you can read more at bestcourseforgolf.org. And the rapidly growing Golf Environment Organisation (golfenvironment.org), or Geo, has created an international green golf certification scheme, working closely with the likes of the Ryder Cup and Gleneagles. Its criteria are not only environmental but also take into consideration social effects. Clubs like La Pinetina in Italy, Ljunghusen in Sweden, and Golfbaan de Rottebergen in the Netherlands already have Geo certificates in their clubhouses.

One thing Geo is passionate about is changing the way we perceive golf. A hundred years ago courses were natural, made with heather, bracken, sand or whatever was indigenous.

In Ireland a good example today is Highfield Golf Country Club (highfield-golf.ie), created by the Duggan family on their farmland in Co Kildare. It was built on natural terrain rather than sand-based greens, resulting in minimal invasion of the soil, and few or no chemicals to maintain them. And any unused spaces have been left “wild”, allowing the local ecosystem to thrive. Now that’s what I call a fair way.


ethicaltraveller.net, twitter.com/catherinemack