In conversation with JUSTIN FRANCIS of responsibletravel.com

Date: Thursday 31st January

Time: 2pm

Location: Theatre 1

David Shukman, one of the BBC's most widely travelled correspondents, has visited more than 70 countries and territories worldwide.

In his current role as Environment & Science Correspondent he has become one of the few journalists to report from both the Antarctic and the Arctic including Greenland, Siberia and even a massive iceberg the size of Manhattan drifting near the North Pole. He has reported from inside a deep crevasse on the Antarctic Peninsular and he was once stuck for a week in a blizzard in a NASA ice-camp.

David's travels have taken him to the depths of the Amazon rainforest, the sand-dunes of the Kalahari desert and the barren wastelands of the dried-up Aral Sea in central Asia. He has flown on the King of Thailand's rain-making plane, been one of the few people to descend underwater in the Adriatic to clamber from one submarine to another, and he has ridden on a tank over the thawing permafrost of the far north of Russia. Previously, as Defence Correspondent, David witnessed the fall of the Berlin Wall, became the first journalist to get inside a Soviet nuclear base, and reported on the siege of Sarajevo during the Bosnia war. He has also reported on the victims of the conflicts in Angola and Sierra Leone. As Europe Correspondent based in Brussels, he visited almost every country in Europe.

David and his wife were rare Western tourists in Vietnam in the mid-80s and spent their honeymoon in Kashmir. Holidays have included surfing in California and diving in Mozambique.

Interviewed by Justin Francis:

Justin Francis co-founded online travel agent responsibletravel.com in 2001. Prior to that Justin was Head of Worldwide Marketing at The Body Shop. responsibletravel.com markets more authentic holidays that maximise the positive impacts of tourism whilst minimising the negative impacts.

The company also founded and organise the worlds’ biggest Award scheme for responsible/eco holidays - the Virgin Holidays Responsible Tourism Awards www.responsibletourismawards.com. responsibletravel.com is the largest travel agent of its kind in the world, and one of the fastest growing travel agencies in the UK selling £20m of holidays in 2007.

Justin is also a Trustee of The Travel Foundation and writes for The Times and The Guardian Travel.