Exodus – Nature and Carbon Corridors Project
Getting nature positive goes beyond reducing our negative impact.
What we know
We wanted to actively support the restoration of the nature and ecosystems which our travellers love to explore.
As a tour operator, we want to be honest and transparent about the negative impacts of what we do. It’s obvious from a carbon point of view. Getting our heads around the impact on nature is the challenge: what does it look like and how do we measure it?
Looking at our actions as a business, we recognised that along with the climate emergency we’re also facing biodiversity collapse, and they’re inextricably linked.
We realised we needed a partner to help us with recovery and regeneration.
Rewilding Europe gave us an opportunity to pilot and co-launch an exciting project.
Image credit: Bruno D’Amicis / Rewilding Europe
What we’re doing
We plan to rewild 100 sqm for every passenger who travels with us.
We’re looking to connect 5 national parks in the Italian Appenines, with 5 nature corridors. The aim is to rewild 5,000 hectares in 5 years, of what is currently barren farming land. The project is multi-faceted, the diverse vegetation will remove carbon from the atmosphere, while the project also engages local communities in helping create nature corridors allowing free passage of species, such as the endangered Marsican brown bear.
The prevalence of the Marsican bear will be a key performance indicator (KPI), along with wildlife such as lynxes, wolves, other wildcats, birds and bees.
Image credit: Bruno D’Amicis / Rewilding Europe
What it’s worth
Once rewilded, the land in the Italian Apennines will provide an effective carbon sink, capturing an estimated 85,000 tonnes of carbon over 5 years.
Rewilding Europe are using this project to work with KPMG and South Pole to understand the carbon removal potential of rewilded land over reforested land, and combine this with Rewilding Europe’s nature restoration potential to develop ‘rewilding credits’.
By supporting the development and sale of these ‘rewilding credits’, we hope to help Rewilding Europe create a more self-sustaining funding model, and other companies like ourselves to not only remove carbon, but proactively support nature restoration too.
Image credit: Bruno D’Amicis / Rewilding Europe
Testimonial
Our sustainability activity has a major focus on climate action, and primarily reducing the carbon footprint of our trips. However, we wanted to go beyond only reducing our negative impact, and actively support the restoration of the nature and ecosystems which our travellers love to explore and are crucial for the long-term survival of our planet. Key for us is this project’s holistic incorporation of biodiversity recovery, carbon removal, and local community engagement
Kasia Morgan Head of Sustainability and Community, Exodus
Working with Exodus Travels in the Central Apennines rewilding area is hugely important for us to scale up our local rewilding impact on the ground and further develop our new and pioneering concept of Rewilding Credits. This way, our partnership not only addresses climate change, but also boosts biodiversity and provides wide-ranging benefits to local people.
Timon Rutten Head of Enterprise at Rewilding Europe
