Cinnamon Hotels and Resorts wins the Silver Award for Best in Responsible Tourism at the International Travel and Tourism Awards held for the first time by the World Travel Market in London last Tuesday. Cinnamon was the only Sri Lankan brand to be recognised at the Award ceremony, competing with tourism destinations such as Kerala, to win this prestigious award.
The award was won for the Cinnamon Elephant Project carried out together with Nature Trails supported by the John Keells Foundation as an initiative for elephant conservation in Sri Lanka.
Dileep Mudadeniya, Vice President John Keells Group, Head of Brand and Marketing, Cinnamon Hotels & Resorts and CEO Cinnamon Life Mall stated “We give importance to projects of this nature as it addresses timely causes in the country and showcases Sri Lanka not only a destination with diverse offerings but is also socially responsible.”
Cinnamon was honoured in front of an audience of more than 500 senior industry professionals at the gala event near WTM London’s ExCeL venue.
Nick Pilbeam, Divisional Director at WTM London’s parent company, Reed Exhibitions led the judging panel alongside UNWTO’s Director of Communications, Marcelo Risi. ITTA’s Co-Founder Paul Nelson said; “We have been delighted with the response from the industry to the ITTAs and blown away by both the quantity and the qualities of the entries.”
The International Travel & Tourism Awards, presented by WTM London, celebrate the success of national, regional and city tourist boards and recognizes outstanding private sector companies and individuals.
Carmeline Jayasuriya, Head of CSR and Assistant Vice President of the John Keells Group stated, “We are delighted to have partnered Cinnamon Hotels and Resorts on this long-term initiative to study the elephant gathering, behavioural and dispersion patterns in Anuradhapura District.
We supported this initiative from its inception as it aligns to our Environment pillar in terms of promoting environmental conservation and sustainability and is also expected to recommend solutions to the human-elephant conflict which has become a pervasive issue in Sri Lanka.”
Considered to be among the top 10 greatest natural animal spectacles in the world, the Elephant Gathering is the largest wild gathering of the Asian elephant, occurring annually within the safety of the protected Minneriya and Kaudulla National Parks in the North Central Province of Sri Lanka.
Under the Project the satellite tracking of two elephant herds from Minneriya and Kaudulla was undertaken through GPS collaring. Data gathered from tracking the collared matriarchs will help understand the exact seasonal movement of the elephant herds, and help tackle the human-elephant conflict through better land and water management recommendations.
“We take great pride in the work that we do to promote responsible tourism in Sri Lanka, and the Cinnamon Elephant Project is one that is extremely significant to us due to the critical nature of this sensitive issue and that this effort will generate valuable information which can be shared encouraging best practices in eco-tourism especially concerning elephants and their habits,” stated Chitral Jayatillake, Head of Nature Trails at Cinnamon Hotels & Resorts.
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