Responsible Tourism Framework

Introduction to the U. Responsible Tourism Framework

Dan Roberts - CEO and Founder U.

U. was formed in 2020. From the outset the goal was to provide 100% carbon offset travel. In 2020 U. offset 90% of all customers journeys – declaring ourselves a 100% net zero tourism company.

While 2020 was a case of just survive, 2021 provided us the opportunity to look closely at all aspects of the business, examining how we did every element and how we could do better. Not just in our goal of being net zero, but also in our teams engagement, diversity and in the trips we offered our customers. While we shook every branch and looked under every rock of the business our goal to be net zero became a central focus. Quite simply – we were doing a half arsed job!

We were lying to ourselves and to our customers by ONLY offsetting the carbon produced by our direct footprint. The initial problem was obvious – we needed to be calculating and offering carbon offsetting for every aspect of the on-the-ground trips to our customers also. This became the basis for Project Net Zero – an ongoing project that defines the U. approach to providing transformational experiences through travel to young people.

Once we started working on being truly sustainable and transitioning to net zero our senses were awakened to the impact our own tourism company was having on nature, the climate and on other cultures. And perhaps more importantly on the customers who travelled with us. Making a difference became as important as providing a great time.

There are 17 sustainability development goals (SDGs) set out by the United Nations. As a travel company we quickly understood it as our obligation to develop our travel experiences such that they contributed to these SDGs. However, while we have 17 in our sites at all times we believe that we can achieve a greater contribution to the SDG by focussing on those in which we can have the most impact as a priority each year.

We have identified “life below water” as our 2024 number one focus.

Focussing on one SDG does not mean we are ignoring the others, quite the opposite achieving one goal has a knock-on effect on others. These include:

Clean-water and sanitation

Improve water quality by reducing pollution, eliminating dumping (remove plastic, Copenhagen clean-up)
Protect and restore water-related ecosystems, including mountains, forests, wetlands, rivers, aquifers and lakes (rebuilding coral ecosystems in Bali, Maldives and Australia)
Support and strengthen the participation of local communities in improving water and sanitation management (Bali cyanide elimination)

Responsible consumption and production

Substantially reduce waste generation through prevention, reduction, recycling and reuse

Climate action

Improve education, awareness-raising and human institutional capacity on climate change mitigation, adaption, impact reduction and early warning