Cape Town luxury hotel, South Africa

At this Cape Town luxury hotel we believe that adopting and excelling in responsible tourism practices is critical to the success of our business. As such, we are committed to driving the achievement of international standards in this regard and have a focus on extending our internal culture to local communities and the environment.

Initiatives currently underway include donating unfinished guest amenities to organisations in need eg. Tygerberg Rotary; Christine Revel Home; Ons Plek etc, providing assistance with refurbishment and donations to Masigcine Home, quarterly visits to Carehaven to assist with projects eg. Gardening, general maintenance etc, donations that assist with skills development projects and income generation, unused kitchen stock and excess staff meals donated to the Eden Mercy Centre, unusable IT equipment donated to Footprints for their arts and craft income-generation project, provide aspiring local artists with gallery space in our restaurant, annual donation of unused books to New Life Project, assisted with collecting blankets for the Good Hope FM blanket project, collection of toiletries and old uniforms for staff at Meikles Hotel in Zimbabwe, volunteer assistance at the Community Chest Carnival, partner with Medical Education Centre to donate vouchers for First Aid and general SHE training for NGOs, purchased soccer balls in aid of the “Save the Children Fund” and donations to Kopanong Guest House, a community upliftment project in Khayelitsha, for distribution to other home- stays to raise the quality of their accommodation

We have partnered with Thope Lekau from Kopanong Guest House to assist with the upliftment of the community in Khayelitsha. She has mentored several woman in the area to start their own home-stays and craft projects. We have donated linen and other hotel supplies to assist them with creating a warm, hygienic and hospitable place for guests to stay. We have paid for Thope's daughter to attend First Aid; Hygiene and Service training that she can take back to teach others in the community. The Peer Educators have encouraged our front office team to recommend the township tours run in the area by young entrepreneurs with small start up businesses. We provide assistance in any other way that she sees may encourage job creation or social upliftment in the area.

We have established a Planet Committee to address environmental and related practices. We have a commitment to focusing on procuring from environmentally responsible suppliers and to commit to and drive responsible environmental practices throughout the hotel (eg: current drive is to reduce paper-trails and work with electronic documents where possible; being selective on printing reports etc). Recently the pool was drained for maintenance, and instead of disposing of all the (chemically-infused) water (100,000 litres) it was stored in several pods to refill the pool. A new filtration system has been installed in the jacuzzis whereby the water is filtered daily and only drained once per month. We use local produce which includes room amenities, food, flowers, gifts and wines.

We recycle all of the following: printer / photocopier cartridges, cardboard / paper, glass, used batteries, all wet waste, garden / flower refuse and kitchen oil is separated and dispatched accordingly. Shredded paper is used in packaging instead of plastic. We have immediate response of maintenance team to potentially environmentally damaging situations (eg: leaking toilets). Stringent monitoring and addressing of littering on the property (eg: smoking area; whether staff or members of the public).

93% of the workforce comprises of local employees. All staff undertake hygiene training (includes eg: saving water when washing hands etc). From first day of start, employees are made aware of values eg: “sense of right & wrong”. New recruits are also assessed against ethical principles and morality.