In Santa Barbara de Pinto, a small town on Colombia’s Magdalena River, I watched AmaWaterways’ cofounder Kristin Karst get teary-eyed as she signed a memorandum of understanding to support the local school with added enrichment programs. Throughout our weeklong sailing in April 2026, the cruise line executives onboard discussed their commitment to supporting communities along the Magdalena River and building this new river cruise destination in ways that benefited Colombian people and businesses with lasting effects.
It’s a new approach to an old idea within the cruise world. Cruise lines have long boasted about how ship visits impact the economies of ports of call. According to the Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA), global cruise tourism was responsible for $27.1 billion in direct spending by passengers and crew in ports of call in 2024.
But when it’s yet another Diamonds International store or other international franchises that often welcome cruise passengers upon arrival, it’s not always clear how much global corporations versus the local communities are benefiting from cruise ship visits. With ports from Greece to Maine to Alaska exploring how to reduce overtourism from cruise ship visitors, port communities are now more than ever demanding a say in how they’re impacted by the cruise industry.
It’s a wake-up call for cruise lines, and executives are recognizing that they need to put more effort into community relations, involving local businesses in port development plans and being more intentional in supporting the resident citizens.
“Our success as a business needs to become the success of the communities we are working with,” said Karst in Colombia. Her line and others are realizing that partnerships and good-faith initiatives can be more valuable than simply transporting guests to ports and hoping they spend money.
A bid to become better business partners
AmaWaterways is working to develop an entirely new tourism infrastructure along Colombia’s Magdalena River and in cities like Mompox, locals stand to benefit if the river cruise line forms sustainable business and philanthropic partnerships.
Courtesy of AmaWaterways
When AmaWaterways decided to develop a new river cruise destination along Colombia’s Magdalena River, the line forged the endeavor as a joint venture with local governments and portside communities. Its two twin ships in Colombia were designed by Camilo Restrepo, a Colombian architect and interior designer, and the line hired local craftspeople and woodworkers to execute his designs using locally sourced materials. AmaWaterways involved Colombian artisans in the creation of shoreside experiences for guests, who can visit workshops and participate in crafts such as filigree work (a type of metalwork ornamentation) in Mompox and iraca palm weaving in Usiacurí.
During my spring Magdalena River sailing, I saw that the line had hired local guides in every port, giving them the opportunity to participate in the tourism economy the ship’s presence had created. In Mompox, the ship’s hotel team bought out a fruit vendor’s haul of pineapples and coconuts to create a breakfast feast full of Colombian specialties for passengers.
This past summer, the company launched the AmaWaterways River Borne Foundation, an extension and formalization of its community support initiatives in Colombia. The River Borne Foundation donates instruments to the school in Santa Barbara de Pinto, which has evolved into a program that provides regular music lessons for the children. Future programs will be focused on enhanced education, language learning, cultural preservation, and career development.
As of the end of August, 210 students have benefited from the foundation’s donations.
This intentional partnering is not limited to small-ship cruise lines. When Carnival Cruise Line developed Celebration Key, its new private beach destination on Grand Bahama Island, it asked local businesses to participate.
More than a year after the port’s 2025 opening, 80 percent of Celebration Key’s food and retail operators are locally owned. These include Mini Donut King and Flippin’ Fritters, local food trucks that were invited to open outlets to serve thousands of hungry Carnival cruisers. The destination supports approximately 1,000 year-round jobs, says Carnival, and has allowed Grand Bahamians who had left the island in search of work to return home.
Sometimes, however, good intentions when it comes to partnering with destinations don’t pan out. When Celebrity Cruises launched its new Celebrity Xcel cruise ship, it created a space called the Bazaar to bring local culture and business aboard in the Caribbean and Europe. The line hired singers and dancers from the ports of call to perform destination-themed shows for guests and stocked its Marketplace shopping experience 80 percent with locally sourced artisan wares to support small businesses.
The ship also had a plan to invite local vendors aboard in port to sell their goods directly to guests, without the line taking a cut. This onboard initiative did not last, and the line now focuses on supporting artisans ashore with excursions that bring guests to local workshops and markets.
Community support
French line Ponant donates its recycled waste from its Antarctica sailings to Argentina’s Garrahan Foundation, which in turns helps the organization raise money for healthcare initiatives.
Photo by Olivier Blaud/Ponant
A cruise port can’t be successful if the local community is struggling. Consequently, numerous cruise lines are stepping up their efforts to bolster the residents of the ports they visit.
“Exploration should create value not only for travelers, but also for the people and environments that make these journeys possible,” said Wassim Daoud, head of corporate social responsibility and sustainability for French luxury expedition line Ponant.
Ponant has teamed up with Argentina’s Garrahan Foundation, a nonprofit that supports education and health initiatives, for an innovative project that does double duty. In southern Argentina, Ponant ships donate recyclable waste, such as aluminum cans and plastic bottle caps, from their Antarctica voyages, improving waste management efforts. The Garrahan Foundation then sells the donated materials, generating funds it can use to support healthcare access, including for pediatric health programs, medical training, and equipment purchases.
Food security is a major focus of several cruise lines’ community work. Disney Cruise Line has distributed more than 19,000 pounds of food to at-risk youth in Alaska over the past two years, and the cruise line partners with the Agricultural Development Organization to build vegetable gardens in local Bahamian schools. In collaboration with federal and municipal governments, sister lines Carnival Cruise Line and Costa Cruises have established a program to donate prepared, unserved meals from their ships for distribution in the ports they visit across Europe and the Caribbean.
Expedition line HX is involved in multiple community projects in Greenland. It provided meals, gifts, and transportation for a Christmas Eve party at the Seamen’s Home in Sisimiut for residents who might otherwise spend the holiday alone. The crew of HX’s ship MS Fridtjof Nansen used HX Foundation money to help the Hamlet of Gjøa Haven Food Bank and Food Security Program in Nunavut distribute food before winter set in. The line is also a partner of the Association of Greenlandic Children, which offers summer camps and school-based violence prevention programs to support vulnerable youth.
Port communities applaud cruise lines that ask local leadership where their support can be most useful.
“The biggest thing is listening to local partners and believing that we are the experts on our own community,” said Alexandra Pierce, tourism director for the City and Borough of Juneau. “There are community partnership efforts that are thoughtful and creative, there are partnership efforts that show genuine involvement where it is both the right thing to do but also demonstrates an understanding of the community fabric, and then there are partnership efforts that feel inauthentic and transactional.”
She praised Norwegian Cruise Line, which teamed up with the city of Juneau and the Alaska Department of Fish and Game to add more bear-proof garbage containers to downtown Juneau. The cruise line stepped in to lead the project and hired a local artist to wrap the containers in art.
In a bid to strengthen ties in Alaska, European line MSC Cruises this past season invited kids from a Ketchikan summer camp program onboard.
Courtesy of MSC Cruises
Similarly, during MSC Cruises’ first season in Alaska, executives connected with Ketchikan’s mayor and local stakeholders to determine how it could better engage the community. As a result, the line welcomed 36 children and 14 staff members from the Ketchikan Gateway Borough Parks & Recreation Summer Camp aboard its ships where they got a firsthand look at ship life, met crew members, learned about Alaska’s marine ecosystem, and enjoyed lunch.
“We are so grateful that MSC Cruises welcomed our campers and counselors aboard,” a camp representative told Afar. “Growing up around cruise ships, they rarely get to see what happens behind the scenes. This experience gave them a chance to explore cruise tourism, discover new possibilities, and create lasting memories.”
Cruise lines are discovering new possibilities for what they can achieve in the destinations they visit when they work with, instead of independently of, the local communities. These efforts won’t solve overtourism issues but could make communities more willing to find ways to work together toward a common goal of sustainable travel.
