Sustainable Travel: Places & Planet

Nature First

Our Nature Net Positive commitment

Ensuring our adventures give far more back to our planet than they take.

Our People, Places & Planet plan works towards improving life through travel – for the places we visit on our adventures, the people we meet when there, and the planet which hosts us. Here, we describe the Places & Planet pillar of our plan.

Our planet faces unprecedented challenges – not only the climate crisis, but biodiversity collapse. The nature and unique ecosystems that we continue to explore on our adventures are vital for the survival of our global society but are left increasingly under threat.

In January 2020, we were one of the first travel companies to declare a climate emergency, and at the beginning of 2021, we made a commitment to our planet – to halve our carbon footprint by 2030, to rewild 100 square metres per passenger, and to compensate for all trip and flight emissions.

Now, we want to take a big step further in our commitment to the natural world, and become Nature Net Positive in the next three years.

What does Nature Net Positive mean?

‘Nature Net Positive’ means giving back to nature more than you take. As a business, we want to ensure that everything we do to create and run our trips not only reduces any negative impacts on natural ecosystems, but proactively seeks to support nature’s restoration and regeneration. This is why that little word ‘net’ is important to us, as it doesn’t let us forget that travel still leaves a footprint – through carbon emissions, waste and pollution, and ecosystem exploitation. We seek to remove and reduce these negative impacts, and outweigh them with our efforts to restore nature wherever possible.

How can we get Nature Net Positive?

Our trips already avoid and reduce some of tourism’s worst impacts on nature – our use of eco-lodges and hotels with smaller environmental footprints, and our stringent animal welfare policy for example. We also contribute towards nature regeneration – with our rewilding commitment and on-trip support of local conservation efforts. Over the next three years, we will be looking to significantly expand on these efforts, including some ambitious carbon management, waste reduction and biodiversity restoration goals.

For more information on our Nature Net Positive plan, click here. Below, we share some key aspects of our Nature Net Positive commitment.

Restoring Italy’s Wild Heart

Restoring Italy’s Wild Heart– a mini-documentary about the people, wildlife and stunning landscapes behind our Nature and Carbon Corridors Project in the Apennines.

Our Foundation enables us to extend our vision of harnessing the positive power of travel for the people and places we visit. Thanks to the generosity of our clients and partners, we support many community-based projects in hard-to-reach destinations. Read more about our Foundation’s work here.

We reached out to our team, clients and partners on the ground to understand which areas of social and environmental impact Exodus Travels should prioritise. Consequently, our People, Places & Planet plan focuses on the following six UN Sustainable Development Goals:

Goal 8 – Decent work and economic growth

Goal 11 – Sustainable cities and communities

Goal 12 – Responsible consumption and production

Goal 13 – Climate action

Goal 14 – Life below water

Goal 15 – Life on land

Find out more about our plan here.