Sun Resorts in Mauritius owns and manages 8 resorts in the Indian Ocean with 3,700 employees and a room capacity of 1,050. The resort is a beneficiary of the SWITCH Africa Green programme through the Greening the Mauritian Tourism Industry project by Association des Hôtels de Charme. The resorts are contributing to greening the country's tourism industry with actions like eliminating plastic bottles and installing solar panels.
Sun Resorts through its SUNCARE programme strongly believes that “caring for the people and the planet” is not only a company responsibility but also a condition for long term business success.
The resort has integrated sustainable consumption and production patterns in the business management of the hotels. The establishment has installed some 3,000 M2 of solar panels and an inhouse water treatment plant and now has 25,000 LED lights to conserve energy use. An inhouse water bottling plant has also been established which saves more than 700,000 plastic bottles per year. Water that is recycled is used for irrigation and already a tree nursery with 4,000 species of plants has been established.
“We got involved with SWITCH Africa Green programme because it is part of our SUNCARE programme where we needed to find innovative ways to recycle our waste,” says Ali of Sun Resorts. “We have implemented the solar panels, the waste management plan where we recycle all our waste. We have marine conservation, recycling of water where we have eliminated the use of plastic bottles through our inhouse water bottling and we are now looking forward to installing water fountains all over the hotel to encourage guests not to come with water bottles.”
These measures have resulted in energy efficiency that has seen a decrease of 3.34kw/GN and water efficiency through use of recycled water. 49 % of the waste generated through the enterprise is recycled through industrial symbiosis venture, and which has since provided substantial savings for the hotel chain. Additionally, every supplier conducting business with Sun Resorts must fill in a Supplier Assessment Questionnaire and sign a supplier code of conduct considering their Quality Management System and Environmental Management System.
As a responsible operator, Sun Resorts is committed to adhering to its legal obligations, sustained environmental protection, social responsibility, health and safety and conduct that reflect highest ethical values through continual improvement by ways of annual benchmarking assessment.
“When making their choice of where to travel, more and more customers are looking for hotels and destinations that are conscious about the environment” Andrew Slone of Sun Resorts said. “They feel that the hotel industry has a responsibility towards sustainability.”
In furtherance of those goals, the group is committed to conserve natural resources and enhancing resources for future generation and protect ecosystem biodiversity. The hotel and resort, is also committed to driving sustainable development and minimising pollution, reducing waste and the consumption of group resources.
To ensure that these commitments are made the resort also reports on key environmental, social and financial performance indicators through its balance scorecard and raises environmental awareness among its associates, suppliers, guests and communities. Finally, the group is committed to the provision of resources, training, equipment and other support to enable fulfilment of this policy, and the review its performance and the effectiveness of its sustainability policy periodically to enable it to determine what needs to be done.
