Sustainability

Sustainability means more to us than good business. We believe, especially in today’s modern world, that caring for our planet is just as important as caring for ourselves. We believe that to make a business a success it must be more than financially viable but beneficial to the well being of the environment. This belief is in the heart of all our operations. Everything we do is planned with sustainability in mind.
We aim to constantly improve ecological, social and economical sustainability in our operations:

Ecological

• As far as we can, we provide ecologically sustainable activities such as: hiking, mountain biking, snowshoeing and other winter activities, yoga, fishing etc. For activities such as snowmobile tours we commission and recommend the use of e-sleds (electric snowmobiles) instead of normal, gas powered, machines.
• We use and recommend Train as transportation whenever possible. In Lapland, away from the railroads we use Neste Renewable Diesel in our vehicles.
• Xwander Nordic is a zero plastic company. We minimise consumption of single-use plastics wherever possible. And we are ambassadors of the recycling movement.
• We aim to minimize our carbon footprint, and the remaining we compensate with Compensate.com.

We want to lead with a good example:

• We collect any litter that we find when out on tour and dispose of it in the correct manner.
• During all of our tours, by policy, we insist on the mantra “take nothing but photographs, leave nothing but footprints” in order to preserve our nature.
• We are proud and grateful of our amazing nature, the cleanest air in the world and the opportunities to enjoy it all year round – and we want to share it, and the importance of protecting it with our clients.
• Whilst on tour, we provide information about the Finnish nature. Facts on wildlife species, national parks and the importance of protecting them as well as the appropriate behavior. We also share information about every-man’s-rights and what that means in practice.

Social & Economical

• We always seek to use local suppliers in order to promote the growth of our local economy and we support small local businesses as much as we can.
• We support local farmers and reindeer herders. As a DMC we provide tourism exclusively to authentic, local providers. We contribute to reforestation. And we cooperate with the Finnish national park authorities, helping to support and protect Finnish wildlife and its habitats.
• We are promoting a year round season in Lapland, and have tours for each season.
• We are aware of the any risks in our activities and take precautions to minimize the risks and ensure everybody’s safety.
• We ensure safe and fair working conditions for our employees.

We are committed to Biosphere Manifesto of the Responsible Tourism Enterprise and Metsähallitus principles of sustainable tourism.

Xwander Nordic has been awarded with Biosphere Active Tourism Certification in January 2021. Biosphere for active tourism is a certification of tourism sustainability designed for companies that offer experiences like outdoor activities and sports,  to improve their performance and reduce the negative impacts of the development of their activity, guaranteeing an adequate balance between economic, socio-cultural and environmental dimensions. Xwander Nordic has been audited successfully meeting Biosphere Active Tourism Certification Standards.

We Compensate:

”There is too much carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. To combat climate change, we must reduce our emissions, but it is not enough. We must also remove the excess CO2.” 

We at Xwander Nordic are doing our best to reduce our emissions and protect the nature. Our daily lives and operations cause unavoidable emissions, however, through Compensate we can still work towards building a carbon negative future.

Compensate consists of the nonprofit Compensate Foundation, which owns the Compensate Operations Ltd. Day-to-day business operations of the organization is handled by Compensate Operations, while the foundation focuses on advocacy work to improve the integrity of the voluntary carbon market

How does it work?

We calculate, with Compensate, the carbon footprint of the biggest emission sources of our products: 1. Transport, 2. Food, 3. Accommodation. Then using “the worst case scenario” values, we financially reimburse our carbon footprint. As all of our activities have a very low carbon footprint, overcompensating  with Compensate’s built-in overcompensation, more CO2 is removed from the atmosphere than we produce.

Compensate uses these payments, in-full, to purchase certified carbon credits.
To meet their demand for sustainability, Compensate independently evaluates all the projects they use. All companies through Compensate are certified with internationally recognized standards. They must also pass strict criteria, which are developed in collaboration with Compensate’s Scientific Advisory Panel. Read more about the projects here.

Measures we aim to take in the near future:

• Xwander Nordic is part of STF (Sustainable Travel Finland) project and is currently applying for certification. The aim is to become certified before the end of 2024. Read more (in Finnish) Business Finland
• We are planning more products that use trains or other more sustainable ways of transport. We want to help our clients to reach us travelling by land or water. When that is not possible, we want to be able to offer our clients an easy way to compensate for the emissions from their flight journey.

Want to travel more responsibly?

Read The sustainable traveler Manifesto and make commitments for responsible travel.

Travelling to Finland? Take the Sustainable Finland Pledge and  make a promise to respect and treasure the Finnish nature, its inhabitants and culture during your visit.

You can read here about all that Finnish nature and national parks have to offer and how to enjoy them responsibly.