{"id":7646,"date":"2020-09-09T19:57:50","date_gmt":"2020-09-09T17:57:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/?p=7646"},"modified":"2020-09-09T19:57:50","modified_gmt":"2020-09-09T17:57:50","slug":"samara-private-game-reserve-joins-a-global-community-of-leading-nature-based-tourism-businesses-advocating-a-sustainable-tourism-recovery-post-covid19","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/activities\/wildlife\/samara-private-game-reserve-joins-a-global-community-of-leading-nature-based-tourism-businesses-advocating-a-sustainable-tourism-recovery-post-covid19\/","title":{"rendered":"Samara Private Game Reserve joins a global community of leading nature-based tourism businesses advocating a sustainable tourism recovery post-COVID19"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Samara Private Game Reserve is delighted to announce its acceptance as a Fellow Member of The Long Run \u2013 a global community of nature-based tourism businesses committed to meeting the highest standards of sustainability encompassing the 4 Cs: Conservation, Community, Culture and Commerce.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe find ourselves in excellent company with more than 70 partners from 22 different countries, collectively safeguarding over 21 million acres of nature, protecting 30,000 plant and animal species, supporting 6,300 jobs, celebrating 120 cultures and improving the lives of 175,000 people,\u201d says Sarah Tompkins, founder of Samara.<\/p>\n<p>Established in 1997, Samara is an award-winning Big 5 reserve located on 67,000 acres of born-again wilderness in the Great Karoo near Graaff-Reinet. A passionate conservation undertaking, Samara has pioneered land-use change in the region, painstakingly restoring 11 former livestock farms across 5 vegetation biomes and reintroducing threatened wildlife including cheetah, lion and elephant.<\/p>\n<p>Samara engages in rehabilitating degraded landscapes, managing water catchments and regenerating carbon sinks, all the while functioning as a \u2018living laboratory\u2019 for researchers from around the world. This conservation commitment is underpinned by a strong sense of social responsibility. Samara employs 60 mostly local staff and is involved in skills training, community development and the preservation of indigenous knowledge.<\/p>\n<p>Just 26 guests at a time are invited to join Samara\u2019s ongoing journey, with an emphasis on active participation in Samara\u2019s projects. Accordingly, as well as the usual safari game drives, bush walks and wilderness picnics, Samara offers hands-on conservation sessions, personalised tours of rewilding projects and immersive experiences such as fly camping.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe believe in the positive and lasting impact of ecotourism, when done conscientiously and sustainably,\u201d adds Tompkins. \u201cIt is our vision that the recovery of tourism post-COVID19 will usher in a new paradigm of travel founded on responsible, ethical experiences that benefit their local spheres of influence. We are excited to work with The Long Run in pursuit of this goal.\u201d For more information, visit www.samara.co.za<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_7658\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-7658\" style=\"width: 600px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/karoo-lodge-evening-1.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-7658\" src=\"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/karoo-lodge-evening-1.jpg\" alt=\"Karoo lodge evening\" width=\"600\" height=\"900\" title=\"\" srcset=\"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/karoo-lodge-evening-1.jpg 600w, https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/karoo-lodge-evening-1-200x300.jpg 200w, https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/karoo-lodge-evening-1-280x420.jpg 280w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-7658\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Karoo lodge evening<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<figure id=\"attachment_7659\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-7659\" style=\"width: 600px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/julius-mkhize-ranger-samara-conservation-spekboom-safari-smaller-1.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-7659 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/julius-mkhize-ranger-samara-conservation-spekboom-safari-smaller-1.jpg\" alt=\"Julius Mmkhize ranger at Samara conservation -   spekboom\" width=\"600\" height=\"899\" title=\"\" srcset=\"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/julius-mkhize-ranger-samara-conservation-spekboom-safari-smaller-1.jpg 600w, https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/julius-mkhize-ranger-samara-conservation-spekboom-safari-smaller-1-200x300.jpg 200w, https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/julius-mkhize-ranger-samara-conservation-spekboom-safari-smaller-1-280x420.jpg 280w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-7659\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Julius Mmkhize ranger at Samara conservation &#8211; spekboom<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<figure id=\"attachment_7660\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-7660\" style=\"width: 600px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/cheetah5-1.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-7660 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/cheetah5-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"450\" title=\"\" srcset=\"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/cheetah5-1.jpg 600w, https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/cheetah5-1-300x225.jpg 300w, https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/cheetah5-1-560x420.jpg 560w, https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/cheetah5-1-80x60.jpg 80w, https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/cheetah5-1-265x198.jpg 265w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-7660\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Cheetahs<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Samara Private Game Reserve is delighted to announce its acceptance as a Fellow Member of The Long Run \u2013 a global community of nature-based tourism businesses committed to meeting the highest standards of sustainability encompassing the 4 Cs: Conservation, Community, Culture and Commerce. \u201cWe find ourselves in excellent company with more than 70 partners from [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7657,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2711,2706],"tags":[5384,5383,5385,5381,5382],"class_list":["post-7646","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-south-africa","category-wildlife","tag-graaff-reinet","tag-great-karoo","tag-karoo","tag-samara-private-game-reserve","tag-the-long-run"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7646","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7646"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7646\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7657"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7646"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7646"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/southafricatoday.net\/travel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7646"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}