November 26, 2025
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EF Responsible Suppliers
Our Responsible Supplier Guidelines are founded on eight key pillars that set the standards for the suppliers we work with
Compliance with laws
Demonstrating environmental sustainability
Enshrining human rights
Engaging local communities
Protecting animal welfare
Maintaining health and safety
Meeting high ethical standards
Monitoring and compliance
Key facts
EF Adventures has integrated responsible travel into its offering since day one
EF Adventures focuses on local and low-carbon suppliers to reduce its environmental footprint
Active travel helps reduce unnecessary transport from A to B, reducing carbon and providing extra adventure for travelers
EF has been in the business of creating unforgettable experiences for 60 years. In that time, we’ve developed a vast network of suppliers, providing accommodation, meals, activities, and transport to our travelers.
In the EF Educational Travel division – which includes EF Educational Tours and EF World Journeys – tens of thousands of suppliers facilitate our travelers’ life-changing experiences. As a travel-based business with a mission to make the world a better place, we understand the urgent need to take steps towards a more sustainable future.
Following our collaboration with myclimate to further understand our environmental footprint, we recognized a large proportion of our carbon emissions come from transportation, hotels, and meals.
In other words: The suppliers we procure can have a massive impact on the environmental footprint we leave through our experiences.
In 2022, EF published the Responsible Supplier Guidelines; a document that acts as a line in the sand for the suppliers we do business with. It contains eight pillars, including environmental sustainability, animal welfare, local communities, and human rights.
According to Jennie Jouvenaar, EF’s Director of Sustainability, “the guidelines serve as a North Star for both suppliers and staff, helping to set expectations and support staff to make informed decisions.”
EF’s newest business, EF Adventures, took up the challenge of integrating responsible sourcing into its procurement process from day one. Launching in 2024, the EF Adventures team immediately set about weaving responsible travel practices throughout their tours, from the suppliers they work with to the way Tour Directors support our travelers.
“We knew that, if we wanted to launch a new product, we had to do it the right way”, said Aaron Ojeda-Rosenthal, Director of Product Development at EF Adventures. “Starting afresh meant we could use the knowledge built up across EF World Journeys over decades combined with a brand-new outlook and platform to integrating responsible travel into our entire value chain.”
In practice, EF Adventures focuses on working closely with local, family-run businesses away from the tourist hotspots, providing travelers with authentic yet low-impact travel experiences.
For Aaron and the team, “that meant forging relations with local people in smaller communities who could help us both with finding the right suppliers and the right places to visit.”
Often, family-run suppliers are already working more sustainably, such as providing more vegetarian meals and local produce, using refillable toiletries, being powered by renewable energy, or even holding green certifications. In EF Adventures, at least 88% of accommodation providers have some kind of environmental policy or certification, and – as EF Adventures grows – we aim to progress on this and other measures.
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Bernat Marti, Director of Operations, and Ludovica Andreotti, Operations Specialist, explained that this means EF Adventures tours are literally designed around the principles of responsible travel, even down to how travelers move between places and the activities they participate in.
“EF Adventures is about going deeper”, Bernat explained. “We want to spend as much time in a location as possible and get to know the culture, but also to minimize transport. If we do have to go from A to B, we can even get there by active travel – such as walking or cycling. This helps us really engage with the community.”
Ludovica added:
“When we design tours, we focus on meaningful, off-the-beaten path experiences. Our travelers want to discover the heart of a region in an active way, not standing in line for hours. Speaking to a woman in Slovenia who runs an organic bee farm is a unique, insightful experience for our travelers. It’s this slow tourism that can help our tours be more sustainable and give our travelers a unique experience.”
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Credit: Kralov Med
Behind EF Adventures is a team that lives and breathes adventure travel. Therefore, our tours are built by people who share a love for the outdoors and the places they explore.
For Glenn Murray Prior, Manager of Tour Directors, “this isn’t a marketing effort or a trend. This environmental and social responsibility is in our DNA. For our customers to trust us, our priorities must be sincere.”
To that end, in addition to working with the right suppliers, Glenn is focused on partnering with Tour Directors who also share these values. Tour Directors are the main contact and local guide for our travelers while on tour, providing a vital role in encouraging responsible behavior.
"Our Tour Directors set an example for our customers. They encourage more than ‘leave no trace’. Tour Directors should look for any way to protect the value of the natural environments we visit."
For both Tour Directors and EF travelers, we produced the Responsible Travel Commitments, which lay out how we can all play a part in supporting local communities, promoting animal welfare, and protecting the environment.
How we engage with our suppliers and our customers is crucial in supporting EF’s sustainability journey. Across EF, multiple projects are underway to decarbonize our operations, while at the same time continuing to offer the life-changing travel experiences our travelers know us for.
As EF’s youngest business, EF Adventures is blazing a trail in the world of responsible sourcing, from which the wider EF world can learn and implement across our business.
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