What are we already doing to help?
- Many companies opt to send guides out to destinations to create a link between themselves and the third party they are working with in country. In developing countries, we have opted to build our own local teams and employ local guides from the areas in which we run our trips. As well as being extremely knowledgeable about the areas in which they work, their wages and taxes are being circulated back into the local
economy. This is also reducing the number of people taking flights to get there, as they are already in destination.
- In Peru we have built a relationship with local conservationists at Tambopata Ecolodge to preserve the environments we are visiting in the Amazon and ensure the
travel we are offering isn’t negatively impacting this destination.
- We are responsible members of Travellers Against Plastic and Leave No Trace; we provide our own waste facilities where necessary and dispose of these appropriately.
- Our teams are actively involved in cleaning up local areas; our guides in Scandinavia, Svalbard, Peru, Nepal and Tanzania are all involved in beach/mountain clean ups regularly to keep the local environments free from human waste.
- In Bhutan, we have an allocated plot of land on the edge of Paro that our local team, and guests visiting the destination, are working together to turn into the Kandoo forest; a wild, native forest that is being grown on land that has been previously cleared for agriculture.
- We have calculated the carbon emissions produced by our trips, taking into consideration: accommodation, fuel, transport, flights and activities - food is included as a ‘default’ option as this varies from trip to trip so we work this out as an estimated average.
- 70% of our trips are considered to be low impact trips (producing less than 22kg of C02 per person per trip); camping, trekking and kayaking doesn’t have the huge
impacts on the environment that more high end travel tends to.
What are our goals for the future?
Our mission for the future is to keep building and developing our systems and methods of travel to increase the opportunities for sustainable travel available to you. It is of huge importance to us that we can all continue to explore the hidden wonders of our world without having a negative impact on the environments within it. We are therefore working to improve the way we work in several aspects:
Carbon Reduction
We have recently delved into each of our products and calculated the amounts of carbon each trip produces.
For more information on how we calculate our carbon emissions, visit Our Carbon Calculations page.
From this information we are able to decipher trips that need adjustments such as reducing the number of domestic flights, the style of accommodation or the time spent at locations within the destination. This information is then passed over to our Product team who are working on ways to offer the same awesome adventures but produce a percentage of the carbon that they currently do.
The huge, stand out factor in reducing carbon emissions is simple really. Reduce the numbers of flights or increase the length of your stay. For 1 person to fly to Tanzania from the UK they are producing over 4 tonnes of eC02! So we need to make this worthwhile.
As many of our trips are fairly low impact once in the destination, it is important to us that our guests are provided with alternative ways to travel to our adventures or given enough time in the destination to make the CO2 tonnage worth it. With this in mind, we are currently updating our information on responsible travel and where possible, we will provide these options for you under the "How to get there" sections of each trip. For those countries that are a little too far away to reach by public transport, our goal is to offer extensions or multi activity packages to extend your stay. This allows you to create the trip of a lifetime and reduce the number of return flights you make to one destination. Check out our 'Ultimate' range for trips that provide all round incredible itineraries for different destinations.
Forest Carbon
Working alongside our partner Forest Carbon, from January 2025 onwards we will be offering entirely carbon-neutral trips, offsetting 100% of our emissions through nature-based projects in the UK, Indonesia and Peru. We plan to include this into every new trip we offer so your trips will be automatically offset upon booking. For more information on our Kandoo carbon reduction visit Our Commitment page.
Low Impact Kandoo
It is so important for the travel industry to offer exciting and adventurous journeys that are also low impact, having minimal effects on the local and global environment.
As stated above, 70% of our trips are considered to be low impact trips (producing less than 22kg of C02 per person per trip), which we are extremely proud of. However we know we can do more.
A big goal for us is to create a range of low carbon adventures (producing less than 22kg carbon per person per trip) which are easily accessible via public transport and provide guests with all the information they need to explore without producing high levels of carbon emissions.
Camping rather than staying in hotels, trekking and kayaking rather than sightseeing via motorised transport and small group sizes all contribute to a lower impact trip. But we can always do better. Our aim is to create a range of offers that are varied and adventurous but allow our guests to travel in a conscientious, responsible manner.