M.A.C.S. Adventure Responsible Travel Policy

Responsible travel and tourism lies at the heart of the Macs Adventure’s vision for delivering adventure excellence. Macs Adventure helps you discover some of the most spectacular landscapes and communities of the world and we take responsible travel extremely seriously. Adventure holidays have positive and negative impacts on the environment and communities that it visits. Our M.A.C.S. Adventure Responsible Travel Policy endeavours to ensure that the positive impacts of our operations and your holiday far outweigh any negative impacts it may have.

Minimise Impact & Maximise Benefit

Our operating policies, office policies, holidays and tours are all designed to minimise impact and maximise benefit to the environment and local communities. Some of the ways we achieve this include:

• We operate self-guided and small group adventures which minimise the impact on the environment and other trail users.
• The majority of our holidays are activity based so the use of vehicles and transport is kept to an absolute minimum.
• Our office policies include recycling, the use of renewable energy, using recycled and sustainably sourced paper, minimising energy and water use, encouraging the use of public transport and cycling/walking to work and using eco-friendly cleaning products.
• Our operational policies include: Using local staff, suppliers, leaders, accommodation and transport so maximum benefit accrues to the local economy. Minimising environmental impact by visiting sustainable destinations, using established paths and designing trips to be low carbon. Using suppliers and accommodation that have responsible and green policies in place.

Action & Advocacy

We believe that by engaging our team and clients in environmental and community projects we can make a real difference. Our clients enjoy an authentic and rewarding holiday and can gain a real insight into the issues facing the local community and environment. Our team knows that they are appreciated and making a difference. And of course the projects we support raise their profile and benefit in numerous ways.

• We support local environmental and community projects through financial contributions, staff volunteer programmes, a voluntary contribution scheme and raising awareness amongst our clients.
• In Scotland we work closely with the Friends of Nevis, a charity which works to support and protect the iconic Ben Nevis and surrounding areas.
• Our client information packs, website and marketing materials give details of the projects we support in order to raise awareness and support for these projects amongst colleagues and clients.
• We communicate regularly with all our suppliers to highlight green and responsible business practices, give hints and tips, share resources and encourage best practice.

Carbon & Communities

• Travel and our business activity does of course contribute to carbon output and climate change. We have put several policies in place to minimise our carbon footprint. The communities we work, live and travel in are so important to the quality of our life and by engaging with our own communities and those we visit we all benefit.
• Macs Adventure offsets 100% of our carbon footprint generated by our office, staff travel, and company vehicles annually through a carbon offset scheme.
• Our holidays are designed to be low carbon. All are accessible by public transport, make minimum use of vehicles and we supply detailed information on accessing the start and end points of our adventures by public transport.
• Where flights are required we include details of appropriate carbon offset schemes and encourage our clients to offset international flights.
• We support community projects in the areas we operate and where possible make our clients aware of and encourage them to visit these projects.
• In our local community we have been instrumental in setting up a recycling scheme for most of the 85 small businesses in our lane and fostering ongoing green initiatives.

Sensitive & Sustainable

Macs Adventure has worked hard to ensure that our holidays are sensitive to the community you are visiting and sustainable over the long term.

• We train our guides in the best responsible travel practices to ensure that our groups are sensitive to local customs and environmental issues.
• We supply detailed information packs to our independent and self-guided clients to ensure they are aware of and observe responsible travel practices and are aware of local customs.
• When planning a new tour we make sure the destination is managed sustainably and that our tours will have a net positive impact on the community and environment.
• Accommodation, partners and suppliers are supplied with our responsible travel policy and practices to ensure the entire supply chain is sustainable.
• We negotiate fair prices and build long term relationships with our local suppliers so they are able to retain expert staff, operate responsibly and prosper in the longer term.

We welcome any feedback on our M.A.C.S Responsible Travel Policy and if you have any great ideas on how we could do things better, local projects we could work with or would simply like to discuss further please do get in touch.