PLACES Goals

Goal:

COLLABORATE ACROSS THE SECTOR TO ADVANCE INDUSTRY’S NATURE REGENERATION STRATEGY AND ACTIVITY

AREA OF IMPACT: Restore, Regenerate, Transform - Strategic target

PROGRESS: The World Travel & Tourism Council (our parent company Travelopia is a WTTC Member) has called on the industry to integrate biodiversity and take action to protect and restore nature by becoming a ‘Guardian of Nature’. Exodus Travels has committed to support this cross-industry initiative and continue to share its own approach to prioritising nature.

NEXT STEPS: Towards the end of 2022, Exodus Travels became one of the first UK travel companies to support the new Wildlife Heritage Areas initiative from World Animal Protection. The project aims to create responsible wildlife watching experiences in a way that gives back to communities, generates local pride in natural heritage and connects our clients with nature and organisations who are passionate about protecting the natural world.

Our partnership with Bee1

Bees play a crucial role in supporting our ecosystem, regenerating our biodiversity and even bolsters our planet’s food production, which is why we strongly believe in protecting and preserving the world’s bee population. Partnering with NGO Bee1 in Wales, we have helped to sponsor 50,000 bees in hives that are pollinating over 200 million plants, flowers and fruit across 10 acres of land.

Goal:

REWILD 100 SQUARE METRES PER PASSENGER AND EXPAND SUPPORT FOR REWILDING.

AREA OF IMPACT: Reduce and mitigate - Ecosystem exploitation

PROGRESS: Our partnership with Rewilding Europe started in 2021 when we launched the ‘Nature and Carbon Corridors Project’ in the Italian Apennines. Across 2022, we continued to commit to rewilding 100 square metres for every passenger and expanded our support of Rewilding Europe to their work in the Velebit Mountains, Croatia. Our funding has enabled baseline studies of biodiversity and carbon capture potential in the region, vital community engagement and the drawing up of a milestone agreement with local municipalities for the rewilding of 300 hectares.

NEXT STEPS: We are committed to continuing our support for rewilding and to ensure that every passenger on an Exodus Travels holiday rewilds 100 square metres of land.

We have also set ourselves a number of further targets to support the conservation and restoration of biodiversity across our destinations.

Our partnership with Rewilding Europe

In the face of climate crisis and biodiversity loss, we recognise the crucial need to protect our natural ecosystems and restore biodiversity. In January 2021, we launched our partnership with biodiversity experts, Rewilding Europe, and together launched the Nature and Carbon Corridors project in the Italian Apennines. The project aims to create 5 nature corridors that regenerate natural habitats and allow safe passage for wildlife. Once rewilded, this area will provide a rich carbon sink, with the potential to remove 85,000 tonnes of carbon over five years.

Our ‘Rewilding the Apennines’ trip aims to inspire customers and encourage nature-based tourism, with all trip profits being donated to support Rewilding Europe’s work. Our short film, “Restoring Italy’s Wild Heart”, showcases the Apennines’ landscape and unique wildlife, while shining a spotlight on how the team at Rewilding Europe and local people are making all the difference to preserve and protect the Apennines for generations to come.

Goal:

ACTIVATE CUSTOMERS IN CONTRIBUTING TOWARDS NATURE AND REGENERATION THROUGH PARTNERSHIP WITH NATUREMETRICS.

AREA OF IMPACT: Reduce and mitigate

PROGRESS : NatureMetrics is our new partner that will help us enable our clients to collect eDNA samples on our trips to build the eBioAtlas – the IUCN’s pioneering initiative to map species globally and support vital conservation and regeneration work.

In FY22, our work on the eBioAtlas was in the early planning stages and not yet customer-facing. We worked to identify our trips where samples could be taken, engaged with our suppliers to generate their support to facilitate this activity and garnered the required licences from country authorities that would allow us to transfer the eDNA across borders and back to the UK lab for analysis.

NEXT STEPS: The first Citizen Science trips to collect eDNA for the eBioAtlas took place in Spring 2023. We are offering a number of departure dates across 17 trips throughout the world.

To help ensure that our adventures give back far more to nature than they take, in 2022, we embarked on an initiative that would put the ability to measure biodiversity into the hands of our clients.

We have partnered with the tech science company NatureMetrics, who, together with the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) are building the eBioAtlas – a global atlas of life in the world’s river basins and wetlands. Through our Citizen Science departures on selected adventures across the world, our customers will collect environmental DNA data from freshwater samples. These samples will then be mapped to find which species are living in those areas and the data will feed into global conservation databases.

Supporting pioneering research to collect data on animal species allows us to learn more about the different animal species in an area and then how the wildlife and nature that support those species should best be conserved.

Goal:

ENGAGE WITH SUPPLIERS AND TOUR LEADERS RE: IMPORTANCE OF NATURE CONSERVATION AND REGENERATION.

AREA OF IMPACT: Reduce and mitigate - Ecosystem exploitation

PROGRESS: Research undertaken during our trips in the Rodopi Mountains of Bulgaria have been written up in academic journals and published in a book as best practices in fostering favourable attitudes towards Brown bears among local village populations. The research recommends that the approach used on these trips could be replicated in other countries to help mitigate human-carnivore conflicts.

NEXT STEPS: We will continue to share this research and identify where it is possible to expand the methodology into other destinations with a view to seeing whether we can help with further awareness and understanding.

Goal:

Animal Welfare Audit Undertaken Across All Trips

AREA OF IMPACT: Reduce and mitigate - Ecosystem exploitation

PROGRESS: Exodus Travels is an active member of the ABTA Animal Welfare Working group alongside industry peers to collectively tackle Animal Welfare issues globally. Over the past 18 months, we have updated our animal welfare policy that follows ABTA’s guidelines see www.exodustravels.com/sustainable-travel/animalwelfare and we have also incorporated these guidelines into our supplier sustainability minimum standards. Unfortunately, we have not yet completed the full audit. We have, however, completed some preliminary work to understand the kinds of animal interactions that take place in our trips. Around 15% of trips involve a wildlife encounter.

NEXT STEPS: We are committed to undertake a fuller animal welfare audit to better ensure our partners and other suppliers are adhering to our animal welfare policy.

Expert guide and award-winning wildlife photographer, Paul Goldstein, launched the Worth More Alive campaign over a decade ago to advance the protection of the endangered Bengal Tiger. Paul set a target of raising £100,000. His aim was to fund the renovation of two schools in Bandhavgarh, India, deliver conservation’s benefits to local communities and engage local people in protecting their stripy neighbours. Paul has completed a number of marathons in his full tiger suit, but none more challenging than the epic Tenzing Hillary Everest Marathon which he finished on 29th May 2022. With the suit now safely hung up for good, the campaign is still continuing to raise money - £108,775 and counting!

Goal:

Increase Equity Of Benefit That From Nature In Destinations

AREA OF IMPACT: Reduce and mitigate

PROGRESS: Through the Exodus Travels support of wildlife and biodiversity in a number

Our Fruit Tree Project in rural India has restored income opportunities for local people. Planting difficult terrain has regenerated the ground and stores carbon.

Zambia is among the most deforested countries their homes every year due to deforestation. Learning Partnerships in Zambia with an of bees, how to care for hives, and for the regenerative income though agriculture.

We continued to raise money for Paul Goldstein’s Bengal Tiger conservation in Bandhavgarh Free to Roam Project in Kenya, which has self-sustaining farming, leaving the remaining

NEXT STEPS: We are actively reaching are aware of these grants and available benefit from nature and wildlife. We are increase equity of benefit.