What sustainability actions are being taken?
We are a family business that has evolved from cattle ranching, to sustainable tourism, and today conservation. In 1979, we recognized that this place was special and began our first ventures into sustainable tourism. Later on, we took our first steps to conserve this unique landscape.
Today, Las Torres Patagonia is a Natural and Cultural Reserve, category V of the IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature).
Park Rangers & Trail Closure: Las Torres Patagonia, through AMA Torres del Paine, is committed to the safety of visitors and the conservation of nature in Torres del Paine National Park. In support of the work of CONAF, Las Torres provides 6 park rangers who have completed and passed their Wilderness First Responder course and are always present on the trails in the park.
Lenga Reforestation: 20 Thousand Lengas was a school reforestation campaign created and organized by AMA in which schools from all over the region participated and raised money to buy of 16,000 lenga trees that will be reforested in burned areas of Torres del Paine National Park. The campaign pledged prizes for three classes from three schools, however AMA decided to include 10 more classes that will have the honor of reforesting Torres del Paine. Some 4,000 plants have been planted so far and the remaining trees will be reforested during May of this year.
Trash Collection: In 2023, recognizing the damage that food waste causes to the ecosystem, Las Torres Patagonia decided to put an end to food leftovers from the Coirón Restaurant, Pionero Bar, and the Staff Cafeteria.
Through the initiative of Las Torres Patagonia’s CEO, Josian Yaksic, a plan was created to send food waste to local pig farms, allowing this food to be used as feed for these farm animals instead of ending up in the garbage.
Environmental Education; In 2004, Las Torres Reserve founded AMA Torres del Paine, a non-profit organization from Torres del Paine, for Torres del Paine. It is now in charge of conservation, research, and environmental education. AMA has already involved, thousands—yes, thousands!—of people. How so many? With a ton of activities, including a volunteer program that brings in 300 people per season.
We should also mention the more than 100 researchers who have been funded and given talks to employees of tourism companies and the general public, as well as contributed their knowledge in scientific publications.
Trail Restoration (Base Torres and Interpretive Trail): Thanks to our partnership with ConservationVIP, we have been able to carry out maintenance work on the trails that connect to the park’s most impressive viewpoint: Base Torres. We help a dedicated team of engineers build sustainable trails for the park, leaving our footprint in Patagonia.
The Interpretive Trail is located in front of Hotel Las Torres and has examples of four biotic provinces, native plants, and a wetland. This trail can be hiked in 1.5 hours and is low difficulty.
Fire Brigade: The company Gasco Magallanes trained the Torres del Paine Fire Brigade to prevent and respond to emergencies involving liquefied gas.
On January 4, the Torres del Paine Fire Brigade received training on Liquefied Gas Emergencies provided by the company Gasco Magallanes.
Sustainable Bar: We recycle glass bottles to make glasses for the Pionero Bar at Hotel Las Torres. We have produced up to two thousand glasses a year. Each bottle weighs 1.8 kilograms (4 lbs.), so there are 3,600 kilos (8,000 lbs.) of glass available to be recycled. The glasses weigh 1.2 kilograms (2.6 lbs.), and about 66% of the bottle is used to make each glass, so that only 216 kilograms (476 lbs.) of the total glass is discarded. This also means that we don’t need to transport 3,600 kilos of glass to the landfill, which is 150 kilometers (93 miles) away, each year.
Holistic Grassland Management: The meadows outside the hotel are part of a holistic grazing management for our horses.
The baqueanos who care for our 190 horses are trained experts with a passion for these animals. Every day, these noble quadrupeds are released to roam freely in different areas of the reserve, which are rotated so that no area is overused. Likewise, our baqueanos are careful to use different horses for different jobs, depending on their health and training.
You can check out our sustainability actions in the following video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bzHqnnCcdns&t=1s