Sustainability

As a brand we are dedicated to taking steps to reduce our company carbon footprint. We donate a proportion of profits from each bag sold to three different UK & international carbon reduction projects. In addition to helping to reduce global CO2e emissions, these carbon offset projects also provide benefits such as increased biodiversity, improved local air quality, education, jobs, food security and heath & well-being in developing countries.

We have partnered with Carbon Footprint Ltd, a UK-based company that delivers solutions for carbon management and carbon offsetting across the world. They are an award-winning family-owned business and are also founding members of the Quality Assurance Standard (QAS) for carbon offsetting, which ensures offset credits are not double-counted (used more than once). They are advocates in practicing what they preach – certified to ISO14001:2015, ISO9001:2015 and carbon neutral.

You can find out more about them and the work they do here: http://www.carbonfootprint.com

The donated funds from your purchases are used to support the following environmental initiatives:

This project involves planting trees in the UK and supports reduced deforestation activities in Brazil to help protect the Amazon rainforest. Planting is a great way to help sequester carbon emissions. Through photosynthesis trees absorb carbon dioxide to produce oxygen and wood. By ensuring that the trees planted are native broad leaf species helps to preserve the UK’s environment and biodiversity. Planting generally takes place in school locations, to enable pupils to learn about the environment in a fun hands-on way, and also other sites such as protected biodiversity sites, farms, parks etc. All trees are high quality cell grown 'whips' (year old saplings). Rainforest protection – the Amazon is the largest remaining rainforest in the world and is known for its amazing biodiversity; containing 10% of all species, including many endangered species. For every tree that is planted in the UK, a tonne of carbon will also be saved in the Brazilian Amazon via the VCS avoided deforestation programme. This allows the planting and protecting of forests and biodiversity in 2 continents. 

You can read more about the project here: https://www.carbonfootprint.com/plantingtrees.html

Landfill sites are significant sources of methane, a greenhouse gas more potent than carbon dioxide. By capturing this landfill gas and using it to produce electricity, the methane and carbon dioxide contained within are destroyed, reducing the emissions released.

The landfill gas (LFG) recovery and utilisation project involves preparing the landfill area for safe recovery and utilisation of LFG to generate electricity. The electricity generated is fed to the national grid, and replaces electricity which would otherwise be generated by fossil fuel fed power plants, resulting in further emission reductions.

This project provides local employment, improves local air quality, reduces fire and explosion risk, generates electricity, and reduces global emissions of greenhouse gases (CO2e).

You can read more about the project here: https://www.carbonfootprint.com/turkey_offset_lfg.html

India’s domestic sector is one of its largest primary energy consumers with 75% of energy requirements met by fuel-wood and agricultural waste. Cooking alone is responsible for 90% of household energy consumption. Approximately 400,000 women and children die every year in India due to exposure to smoke from household use of solid fuels.

The Breathing Space Programme distributes cleaner and greener cooking stoves to households. By replacing traditional stoves it contributes towards solving the indoor air pollution problem as well as reducing Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions. It reduces pressure on local forests as higher efficiency means less fuel wood is required. Each cookstove will reduce approximately 5 tonnes of CO2e over its useful life.

You can read more about the project here: http://www.carbonfootprint.com/gs_india_cookstoves.html

All our mailers are made of 100% Recyclable materials - please recycle with your carrier bags.