SUSTAINABLE AND RESPONSIBLE TOURISM – GOING GREEN AND THE GREEN DIRECTORIES BY JETWING
Jetwing Beach, Jetwing Vil Uyana and Jetwing Lighthouse have been involved in various activities within each hotel towards good environmental practices. We believe we need to start small and with the basics and have therefore taken many simple yet effective initiatives from changing to energy saving bulbs where possible to having a colour coded program to switch off lights, to discontinuing the use of plastic bags in our hotels to conducting training classes for the village schools and the associates at the hotels to composting of waste to using of grey water for the watering of the gardens, to using bio degradable chemicals in our laundries and kitchen wash ups to using natural insect repellents instead of aerosol cans of chemical to colour coding crates in the kitchens and many more.
We have now become documenting these activities and are gaining wide spread recognition as an environmentally conscious hotel group. Our Green Directories have also become a text book for environmental awareness at a series of seminars conducted by an environmentalist in Germany who spent some time studying and working in Sri Lanka.
JETWING ASSIST ARUGAMBAY DEVELOPMENT WITH TRAINING PROGRAMMES
Following the initial Training Needs Assessment that was carried out for the hoteliers of Arugam Bay, Jetwing conducted a series of training programs on Hotel Housekeeping, Basic Hygiene & Environmental friendly hotel keeping, International Cookery and Restaurant & Bar Service, at the invitation of Mercy Corps, an American aid agency that initiated this worthy project to help to resurrect the tsunami-shattered lives of the people of this area. Arugam Bay consists mostly of modest hotel and guesthouse caretakers’ whose livelihood is providing accommodation and meals to surfers mostly from UK, Germany, Australia and Scandinavia.
“Once again, Mercy Corps and the Arugam Bay Tourism Association would like to thank Jetwing for the continued support in recovery and in improvement of facilities and services. The recent training program was an overwhelming success. Over 40 hotels and restaurants sent participants, and a total of 90 owners, managers and employees attended one or all of the modules. Certificates are displayed with pride and participants are excited to tell us all about what they learned.
"We’re optimistic about the future, and a lot of this optimism stems from the experiences and the knowledge gained through the association with Jetwing," said Lyn Robinson, Program Manager, Mercy Corps.
CSR ACTIVITIES IN EACH OF OUR UNITS
Each of our units have in their own right carried out various CSR activities that they are proud of with the participation and through the dedication of their individual teams. Some of them are listed below.
Jetwing Ayurveda Pavilions
- Have supported the Vicinity School Sports Meet
- Development of Loyala College, Daluwakotuwa
- Negombo Beach cleaning.
Jetwing Beach
- Donated 09 traditional catamarans and 02 outboard motors to the traditional fisher folk badly affected by the Tsunami.
- Repaired school steel furniture for Ethukala School which is an underprivileged school in the community.
- Held a Workshop on Biodiversity and 5S for Ethukala School.
- Seminar about “Sexual Education” for the children, Teachers and Parents of schools in the area was held.
- A practical session “How to Control Mosquitoes” was conducted with the help of Public Health Officer for the school children.
- A Cookery Demonstration was held on 21st of June at Jetwing Beach for the children of Ethukala Sinhala mix school.
- Plans are made to provide fully equipped computer labs to five needy schools in Negombo.
- Shramadana - Beach Cleaning every 01st and 03rd Tuesday of the month
- English Classes are held for the community every Mondays and Friday.
- A Taxi Service Through The Community
Jetwing Blue Oceanic
- Conducted English classes to the school leavers of the vicinity and upon successful completion, they were absorbed to the hotel staff cadre
- On going Hospital Project – maintenance of the Pre-mature baby ward. Also due to a water & electricity leakage the hospital was closed and to re-open the hospital our associates with their efforts re-did the toilets and the wash room areas of all wards in the new building.
Jetwing Hunas Falls
- Wattegama General Hospital – Built a waiting room for the Out Patients Department.
- Wattegama General Hospital – Men & Women wards are painted once a year.
- Donated medicine to the Wattegama General Hospital.
- Books donated to the village children.
- Curtains donated to the Elkaduwa School.
- Organized programmes for school children. E.g. Field visits, demonstrations on cookery, environment, housekeeping etc.
Jetwing Lighthouse
In 2005, Lighthouse Hotel & Spa was awarded the PATA Gold Award 2005 in the field of Education and Training – Educational Programme for their project A Taxi Service Through The Community. This project involved the training and grooming of 45 youth in the immediate surrounding to provide a professional taxi service to hotel guess. To achieve this, a series of training classes, field visits to places of interest etc. were carried out over a year. This ensured that these youth were guided from being hangers on of the community, to useful economic contributors.
- Wherever possible, purchases are made from area suppliers. For example, all cane baskets used by the housekeeping and kitchen departments are brought locally.
- Lighthouse Hotel & Spa shops do not carry any goods that can be purchased in local shops to avoid competition with local businesses.
- Financial assistance is given to area schools to assist with educational programmes. The Chef and his staff carry out training programmes in Home Economics for students from local schools.
- A donation of a trishaw was made to an Elders’ Home in Tangalle.
- Lighthouse Hotel & Spa supports the Shylamadhayamaya Buddhist Temple by helping in its refurbishment, and has helped raised funds to build a shelter for a statue of the Lord Buddha that was donated by the people of Thailand to this temple. It has also donated funds to build a library in the temple premises that will feature books on all religions. The associates of Lighthouse also donated the pinnacle for the temple.
- After the Tsunami of December 2004, Jetwing initiated the “Jetwing Relief Fund”, a fund aimed initially at collecting financial donations from well wishers and other business partners to rebuild the lives, livelihoods and homes of those affected by the Tsunami of December 2004.
- Lighthouse Hotel & Spa, has built or purchased new homes for a) 12 associates who lost their homes, b) two families opposite the hotel who not only lost their homes but also their breadwinner, and c) 12 additional houses on request. In addition, it has upgraded and refurbished all facilities of a children’s orphanage nearby run by the Young Men’s Buddhist Association. Funds have also been donated for purchasing basic household amenities and restarting livelihoods and small businesses.
- Conservation Education & Biodiversity Conservation
- The hotel has two resident naturalists, who interact with guests and staff and create awareness about the environment.
- Nature tours, promoting biodiversity conservation are a prominent feature of the services provided...
- Naturalists visit schools to conduct environmental awareness programmes.
- Naturalists work support and guide local environmental NGOs.
- All members of staff have been and are given in house and external training on biodiversity conservation and environmental management.
- Jetwing Lighthouse, like all other Jetwing Hotels, supports conservation activities by providing board and lodging for researchers, students and academics.
Jetwing Tropical Villas
- A Taxi Line Through The Community
- Supported the RTP Program called “LINC - Learning Involving Nurturing Community” where the Beach Boys were made stake holders.
Jetwing St. Andrews
- Awareness programmes were held for O/L’ & A/L s’ students the topics discussed were about Bio diversity in Nuwara Eliya and also their school syllabus
- St. Xavier’s, College,
- Gamini Central College
- Painters School
- Explained about History of N-Eliya & historical hotels for A/L students for their school projects.
- Food demonstrations - were conducted for A/L students of Painters School by the Exe: Chef.
- Housekeeping demonstration - were conducted for O/L students (Home science)
- Shramadana campaigns were done by the hotel staff at the base hospital in N-Eliya.
- Awareness programmes were done by the Naturalist for villagers who are lives around the Piduruthalagala reserve.
- Timber and roof sheets were donated for the poor associates who live around Pithuruthalgala.
- Special Events were organised for the Associates children on New Year Celebrations.
- Food, clothes and etc were donated to Hawa Eliya temple on their special ceremonies.
- Fresh vegetables and herbs were donated to St. Xavier’s church.
- Tea parties were organized for the disable army soldiers.
- A training session was conducted by Dr. Sarath Wijesooriya on “Happy Family Life” for the associates and invitees of Nuwara Eliya.
- A programme on Bio Diversity at Painters College in Nuwara Eliya
- Identification of flora & fauna done for students of St. Xavier’s college
- Shramadhana campaign with CSR committee members.
- Donations for army soldiers
- Dr. Sarath Wijesooriya’s programme on “Happy Family Life”
Jetwing Vil Uyana
- Jetwing Youth Development Project – winner of PATA Grand Award 2007 for education and training.
Jetwing Youth Development Project
Bringing Smiles To Rural Youth (Vil Uyana)
Like most other rural villages in Sri Lanka, the hamlet of Rangirigama and the surrounding Rotawewa and Kimbissa are burdened with youth unemployment. Jetwing Youth Development Project is an initiative designed to develop rural youth for suitable employment within Jetwing Hotels or create the opportunity to find employment with other hotels in the country or overseas. Their positive attitudes, natural talents, keenness to learn and good discipline are overshadowed by their poor knowledge of English, the biggest hindrance to fit themselves into the jobs available in the country, especially with the private sector.
The first stage of this program was initiated at Vil Uyana in Sigiriya which opened its doors to Tourism in October 2006. A program of training to fill the ‘skills gap’ was commenced with an English training program that continued for six months. In the second month of the program, from a process of selection, the youth were categorized into areas as per their personality profiles and entry level industry training was conducted at the hotel site in Housekeeping, Front Office, Restaurant & Bar Service and Cookery, alongside English language training. Nature and wild life, Customer care, Japanese 5S, Personality Development, Life Skills and many other helpful topics were added to the program for the benefit of the youth. Hotel visits were arranged for exposure and to build confidence. On successful completion, 60 youth passed out at a ceremony held at Vil Uyana under the distinguished patronage of Secretary to the Ministry of Tourism, the AGA-Dambulla, representatives of the media and other dignitaries. Invitees were pleasantly surprised by the display of their natural talents by way of speech, drama and song that touched the hearts of all. Some of the trainees are now employed at Vil Uyana furthering their skills to become professionals - reaching out with an abundance of warmth & hospitality with their charming Sri Lankan smiles!
Please download our JYDP document & the JYDP movie for further information
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