[Missing Credit]'Loving Love Queenstown': Ziptrek Ecotours founder Trent Yeo. Photo: Ziptrek Ecotours Queenstown’s Ziptrek Ecotours has become a Love Queenstown ‘Impact Partner’, strengthening its support for local climate, conservation and biodiversity projects. The company’s been involved with the community fund since it launched in 2023, but the new partnership, through which Ziptrek either commits 1% of net proceeds or $10,000 or more annually, will provide sustained financial backing for grassroots projects across the Whakatipu. Contributions to the fund are pooled, with 80% supporting immediate environmental action through annual grants, and the remainder invested in an endowment fund for future generations. Ziptrek founder Trent Yeo says the new partnership makes their support “more direct and ongoing”. Love Queenstown community fund coordinator Ash Bickley says the Ziptrek team’s shown what’s possible when a business puts “people and place at the heart of everything it does”. Since opening above Queenstown in 2009, the company’s has planted more than 6000 native trees and contributed well over $250,000 to community and environmental organisations. It was also Queenstown’s first tourism operator to achieve Net Zero Carbon Business Operations certification, which it has maintained for six consecutive years. “Queenstown is developing as a place where people can formally, functionally and loudly contribute,” Yeo says. “And our community wants to see that.” — TRACEY ROXBURGH
