South Africa

St. Petersburg – October 29, 2026 -- Travelers are booking pricier trips: policies covering trips insured for $30,000 or more rose 27.2% in Q3 2026 compared with the same period last year, according to travel insurance marketplace Squaremouth.

That is more than twice the 12.9% growth in insured trips overall. Trips insured for under $10,000 fell 2.3%, per Squaremouth's Q3 2026 Travel Insurance Trends Report.

The shift was foreseeable. In April, Squaremouth surveyed more than 3,000 travelers, and 23% said they planned to spend more on premium or bucket-list trips in 2026.

Safari bookings in Rwanda grew 33.3% in the peak Q3 window

Q3 is the peak booking window for luxury safaris. The most popular destinations all grew:

New York – September 23, 2026 -- World Animal Protection, working with Collective Fashion Justice, has released a new investigation called Blood Feathers, documenting undercover footage of ostrich feather farms in South Africa cutting feathers above the bloodline and later pulling them out with pliers.

South Africa produces 75% of the world's ostrich products, including feathers, meat and skin. In the 2024-25 season, 150,000 ostriches were slaughtered there for these trades, and more than 150 tonnes of feathers were exported globally.

Farms confirmed supplying feathers to YSL, Louis Vuitton, Dior, Chanel and Shein

Investigators identified farms and processing facilities in the region that confirmed supplying feathers to these luxury houses and to fast-fashion retailer Shein. At one farm, birds were live-plucked every six months, a practice the industry itself refers to as producing 'blood feathers' because of the bleeding it causes.