Siem Reap is a popular destination among international tourists who arrive in droves to marvel at the nearby ancient monuments of the Angkor era, as evidenced by the US 4.9 billion dollars the industry generated in 2019. However, the concept of sustainable travel has largely failed to take root in this city. Dividends from the tourist sector are skewed towards foreign-owned businesses. Whilst it’s true that many tourism-related jobs are created for local people, they tend to be low paid, both within the hospitality sector itself, and the related service industries such as construction and transport. Local people can also access the tourism dollar through street hawking. Meanwhile, the rise of tourism has been blamed for fueling inflation and exacerbating air pollution.
On a more positive note, travelers visiting Siem Reap, Cambodia can now support local community empowerment programs with Treak Creations, a fashion brand that sells ethically produced apparel. This social enterprise was started in 2022 to uplift the people of Treak Village, a rural community situated a 20-minute drive away from Siem Reap. Despite its close proximity to a vibrant tourist hub, Treak is still blighted by patchy infrastructure as illustrated by the village’s lack of piped water and a functioning sewage system.
Salin Rin, the founder of Treak Creations, grew up in an impoverished farming family. At the age of 19, she enrolled in a free tailoring training program offered by the government to women from disadvantaged families. Upon completing her training, Salin served an apprenticeship under a market trader before relocating to Siem Reap in 2008, seeking better opportunities than those afforded by her village home in Battambang province. She subsequently set up her own business in 2010 and ran it for two years until she accepted the position of project manager of Treak Community Centre, an NGO dedicated to improving the welfare of the village’s residents.
From 2016 onward, Salin started to offer free tailoring classes to the village women, equipping them with skills essential for making a living in the tailoring industry. She’s also loaned sewing machines to two of her former trainees, enabling them to earn an independent income. Six years later, expanding on the vocational classes she’d been conducting, Salin established Treak Creations, offering employment opportunities to local women in a community where good jobs are still scarce.
The company’s employees are given benefits such as medical leave and subsidised healthcare. Additionally, Salin’s staff are also paid a decent salary while enjoying flexible working hours. One employee relates how her salary has permitted her to cover her family’s essential expenses with enough left over to purchase a new smartphone. Another describes how she’s at liberty to leave the workplace during the afternoon to prepare lunch for her children.
Salin’s priority is to ensure that women in Treak have a viable alternative to leaving the village in search of employment in the cities. She emphasizes how vital it is for young mothers to remain with their children to ensure family units remain intact. More ominously, she also points out that young rural women who emigrate to urban areas, often fall prey to trafficking syndicates that force their victims into the sex trade. Having narrowly evaded a trafficking attempt in her youth, Salin is determined to protect the young women of the village from similar ordeals.
On a more holistic level, Salin aims to eradicate the cycle of rural poverty by using the company’s profits to fund Treak Community Centre’s programme of offering free education to the village children. Many locals in Siem Reap are unable to secure the better paid white-collar jobs in the hospitality sector due to their lack of formal education. In a village where adult illiteracy remains an issue, Salin’s initiative allows the children of Treak to gain access to important opportunities that their parents have been denied. This undertaking of hers has drawn widespread support from the villagers.
Related Reading: Ethical Eateries in Siem Reap, Cambodia
Further burnishing Treak Creations’ credentials as a company dedicated to upholding the values of sustainable travel, Salin has embarked on a fabric recycling scheme. The rise of the fast fashion industry has resulted in fabric waste from Cambodia’s textile factories being used as fuel in highly polluting brick kilns. Treak Creations upcycles discarded fabric remnants into stylish new apparel, doing its part to minimize the environmental footprint of what is otherwise an ecologically destructive industry.
Certain ethicists have asserted that the denizens of affluent nations are guilty of harming the indigent populations of the world by being complicit in foisting “an unjust institutional order upon them.’’ In line with this strain of moral reasoning, we as tourists have helped to perpetrate an economic paradigm that has burdened the people of Siem Reap with negative consequences while depriving them of a commensurate share of the dividends from a lucrative industry. In supporting social enterprises such as Treak Creations, we can promote the cause of sustainable travel while redressing the wrongs that we have unwittingly inflicted.
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When considering flights, you can utilise platforms like Skyscanner or Kiwi to compare flight costs and identify flights that minimise your carbon emissions. Additionally, if you are able, you can offset your flight’s environmental impact through Offset.
Recommendations: Here are some companies offering sustainable and responsible tours and experiences:
– G-Adventures, for small group travel with locally based guides, supporting local communities.
– Tripaneer, for wellness experiences and retreats.
– Get Your Guide, for day trips and short trips.
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