FCM, a travel management companies, has partnered with South Pole, an expert in global climate action and project development, to launch a new global carbon offsetting programme.
FCM committed to offset all staff travel from January 2019, and will continue with this effort.
The South Pole partnership will allow FCM to support multinational clients in setting up a net zero solution to naturalise the carbon impact of their business travel and will make a significant difference in helping them meet their sustainability goals.
What’s significant in the FCM South Pole partnership?
It enables clients to offset against global flights, hotel accommodation, rail bookings, car rental and other business travel components.
FCM calculates, records and reports CO2 emissions globally per item for each client, who chooses from climate action projects against which to offset their total carbon footprint.
FCM and South Pole compiled a list of 12 positive environmental impact projects, including forestry conservation or restoration and community energy or water programmes.
Each is a global standard sustainability project. Examples include Access to Clean Water for Better Health in Cambodia; Solar Power for a Cleaner Energy Future in India; Kariba Forest Protection in Zimbabwe; and Uretim Osmaniye Wind Farm in Turkey.
Clients select up to four projects to suit their budget, geographic area and impact categories.
The partnership dovetails with development of FCM’s new proprietary platform technology, which puts sustainability at the heart of the booking process.
This helps employees make better decisions regarding their carbon footprint, while helping organisations meet their global sustainability goals.
FCM Platform’s sustainability dashboard shows travellers their individual CO2 travel stats and enables travel managers to see total carbon footprint and CO2 savings achieved.
The future roadmap for FCM Platform includes functionality whereby the sustainability dashboard will also show carbon credits reporting for each client and how emissions translate into offsetting credits and projects.
What are the stakeholder’s opinions?
Marcus Eklund, MD, FCM said: “We’re making sustainability a core pillar of our customer offering for 2021, putting greater focus on guiding and supporting clients’ objectives.”
“This is particularly in terms of CO2 reporting and a global net zero solution that enables our clients to contribute to positive climate action. Sustainability has moved higher up our customer’s business travel agenda, despite the impact of Covid-19.”
“In fact, after the travel bans of 2020 enabled companies to reduce their carbon footprint from travel significantly many are not only re-emphasising their overall environmental objectives post-Covid, they’re making them an integral part of travel policies and RFPs.”
Melissa Elf, GM at FCM, said: “While sustainability has been on the travel agenda for many years, the disruption caused by Covid-19 has had a big impact on business travel policies.”
“Our customers are now more than ever seeking greener travel solutions to reduce their carbon emissions that align with their corporate social responsibility.”
“The FCM Platform helps our customers to better understand their own carbon footprint, provides options to enable them to make low-carbon travel choices, and offers an education tool that empowers them to change their behaviours across the whole travel journey.”
