Trying to make more thoughtful travel choices in a country of vast distances and fragile landscapes.
Travel to Mongolia has an impact. Pretending otherwise would not be honest
A Note From Jess
Many people travel to Mongolia because they want to experience its open landscapes and meet herding families.
But those landscapes and families are already being affected by climate change.
Winters are harder to predict. Summers can be drier. Pasture is under pressure. Water sources are changing. Dzuds can bring huge livestock losses. For herding families, climate change is not an abstract future concern. It affects income, food security, movement, decision-making, and whether younger generations feel able to continue a rural way of life.
This is the complicated place where our work sits.
We run journeys in Mongolia, one of the most remote and landlocked countries in the world. Most of our guests have to fly here. Our trips involve long distances, road journeys, vehicles, food supplies, accommodation, water, waste, and resources. We cannot pretend travel to Mongolia has no impact.
But we also know that tourism, when done with care, can provide income, connection, and practical support to rural families, local projects, national parks, small businesses, and our Mongolian team.
So this Climate Action Plan is not a claim that we have solved our climate impact.
It is a working record of what we are trying to reduce, what we are still trying to understand, and how we are making decisions as a small company working in a country already feeling the effects of climate change.
We are a very small Mongolia-focused company, working with around 150–200 travellers a year.
We do not have investors, shareholders, or a dedicated sustainability department. We are registered in Mongolia, pay taxes in Mongolia, maintain Mongolian bank accounts, and employ Mongolians.
Our scale is small. Our resources are limited. But our decisions still matter.
We created this Climate Action Plan after signing up to Tourism Declares a Climate Emergency and the Glasgow Declaration on Climate Action in Tourism.
Both ask tourism businesses to take climate action seriously. For larger companies, that may include formal carbon accounting, published reduction targets, and detailed reporting. For us, as a very small company, it means starting honestly from where we are: understanding our impact, reducing what we can, being transparent about what we cannot yet measure, and linking climate action to the wider responsibilities we report on through our annual Impact Reports.
For us, climate action is not only about carbon reporting. It is also about considering our wider impact: on people, places, livelihoods, landscapes, water, waste, food, transport, and the way tourism shapes expectations of Mongolia.
That is why this Climate Action Plan sits alongside our annual Impact Reports. The reports help us look more honestly at where our money, time, relationships, and responsibilities go. This plan helps us ask how those choices connect to climate and environmental impact.
At present, we are not publishing carbon measurements for each of our tours.
This is not because carbon does not matter. It does. But proper carbon measurement takes time, money, and specialist knowledge. It means gathering reliable data across transport, accommodation, meals, fuel use, office operations, domestic flights, guest choices, supply chains, and the many small decisions that shape a journey.
For a small company like ours, that is a much bigger task than adding a carbon figure to a webpage.
There is another challenge. Tourism in Mongolia has changed significantly since the pandemic. We are still working out which experiences feel right for us, for our team, for our guests, and for our long-term local partners. Some tours continue. Some have changed. Some may no longer be the right fit.
Until our tour structure is more settled, it is difficult to measure each journey meaningfully and consistently.
So for now, our focus is reduction before measurement.
We would rather be honest about what we can and cannot currently do than publish carbon figures we cannot properly stand behind.
International Flights
Our current climate action focuses on the parts of our work where we can make practical decisions.
We limit unnecessary domestic flights and avoid short highlight-based itineraries that move guests quickly across Mongolia simply to fit more into less time.
We encourage longer, slower journeys that give more time to each place and reduce the pressure to consume Mongolia as a checklist.
We use trains where they make sense, including journeys that help guests experience Mongolia beyond private vehicles.
We keep our group sizes small and limit the number of departures we offer each year.
We carry filtered water and refillable water containers in our vehicles to reduce reliance on single-use plastic bottles.
We plan meals carefully, buy locally where possible, and avoid building menus around imported foods.
We support low-season travel with a discount, helping to spread income more evenly for our team and local partners.
We work with long-term local partners rather than constantly creating new routes and putting pressure on new communities.
We prepare guests honestly, including talking about waste, water, toilets, road journeys, limited infrastructure, climate pressures, and the realities of modern Mongolia.
These are not dramatic actions. But they are practical, and they fit the scale of who we are.
We are not claiming to be a low-carbon company.
Travel to Mongolia is not low carbon for most international guests because it usually involves long-haul flights. Mongolia is also a country of long distances, and road journeys are part of how most people experience it.
We are also not currently claiming that our trips are carbon neutral, carbon positive, or fully offset.
We have looked into Mongolia-based climate and pastureland projects, and we would like to support this kind of work when funds allow. But at present, we cannot make a meaningful financial commitment to a carbon project without taking money away from other responsibilities, including our team, our local partners, and our existing community work.
So we are choosing not to overstate what we do.
We are a small travel company trying to make more thoughtful choices in a country where long journeys are part of the reality.
Most guests have to fly to Mongolia. We do not include international flights in our trips, and guests travel through different routes and airlines, so we do not currently measure this accurately.
But we recognise that promoting travel to Mongolia means we are part of that impact.
Once guests are in Mongolia, we make choices where we can. We limit unnecessary domestic flights, avoid short fly-in/fly-out highlight loops, include trains where they add value, and design longer road-based journeys that give more time to each place.
Mongolia’s vast size and limited infrastructure make domestic flights the most convenient way to move quickly between regions. But we do not design journeys that simply fly guests from one highlight to another.
Instead, we focus on slower, more considered travel.
That means longer road journeys, more time in each place where possible, and experiences shaped around the people and landscapes we work with rather than a fixed list of sights to tick off.
We personally research, design, and manage our trip logistics. We work across Mongolia with long-term local partners, families, projects, and communities. These relationships form the core of our journeys.
We do not ask our local partners to change their daily routines for our convenience or for our guests’ entertainment. If a family is busy with livestock, family responsibilities, haymaking, winter preparation, or everyday work, that comes first. Travel in Mongolia needs to make space for real life, not reshape it into a performance.
We also offer only a limited number of departures each year. This helps us avoid sending a constant flow of guests to the same families or places, and reduces the risk of turning communities into fixed stops on a tourism circuit.
We actively promote low-season travel by offering a 15% discount outside peak season. This helps spread income more evenly for our Mongolian team and long-term local partners, while also reducing pressure during the busiest summer months.
These choices are not always the most commercially efficient. Shorter, faster, highlight-based trips are often easier to sell. But slower travel fits better with the kind of company we are trying to be.
Food, water, and waste are practical daily issues on every journey.
Our team prepares most meals outside Ulaanbaatar using mobile kitchens carried in our vehicles. We buy locally where possible and avoid building menus around imported foods.
We carry filtered water and refillable water containers to reduce reliance on single-use plastic bottles.
Waste is difficult in Mongolia because infrastructure is limited, especially outside Ulaanbaatar. We cannot solve this, but we can reduce what we add to it. We also ask guests to take responsibility for non-biodegradable and sanitary waste.
We believe it’s our responsibility to be transparent and to demonstrate our impact. With the guidance of Responsible Tourism Consultant Léa Jacquot-Benson, we are currently establishing specific metrics and goals to inform the publication of an annual impact report. While impact measurement involves a degree of subjectivity, we are focusing on the following areas:
People:
Team: remuneration & employment, health & wellbeing, satisfaction & engagement
Guests: satisfaction & engagement, equity, diversity, and inclusion
Place:
Partners: including suppliers and community partners
Biodiversity: conservation efforts and impact
Planet:
Energy, waste, and water management
Climate impact and pollution reduction
Prosperity:
Ethical practices
Profit and revenue
Mongolia is already being affected by climate change.
For herding families, this is not an abstract issue. It affects pasture, livestock health, water sources, seasonal movement, income, and decisions about whether younger generations can remain in rural areas.
Dzuds — severe winter conditions that can cause widespread livestock loss — are becoming part of a wider conversation about climate pressure, land use, pasture degradation, and rural vulnerability.
Travellers often arrive wanting to experience herding life. But that way of life is under stress. We believe responsible tourism should not romanticise it without also acknowledging the pressures behind it.
We use the Sustainable Development Goals as a framework, but our work does not begin with them. It begins with Mongolia, our team, our guests, our local partners, and the choices we make as a small tourism company
The goals most connected to our work are:
Tourism can create opportunities for women, but only if companies make deliberate choices about employment, training, confidence, safety, and leadership.
At Eternal Landscapes, all our trip assistants are Mongolian women.
Some are teachers. Some are students. Some are mothers. Some work with us alongside other careers or family responsibilities. Many did not come into tourism through a formal route. Our role is to create space, training, mentoring, and flexible work that allows them to develop confidence and skills over time.
This is not always simple. Women’s lives are complex. Family expectations, childcare, study, health, confidence, and social pressure all shape whether someone can work in tourism.
But we believe this is where small companies can make a difference.
We were awarded Gender Equality Champion by Equality in Tourism International for this work, but the real value is in the long-term support behind the award: flexible employment, training, mentoring, and keeping the door open for women as their lives change.
There are significant inequalities between urban and rural Mongolia, and between those with access to education, language skills, transport, networks, and tourism opportunities, and those without.
Tourism can sometimes widen those gaps. It can benefit people who already have good English, good vehicles, good online visibility, or access to international contacts.
We try to work differently.
We build long-term partnerships with rural families, community projects, women, older drivers, and people whose knowledge or skills may not fit neatly into mainstream tourism marketing.
This does not solve inequality. But it does mean asking who gets included, who gets paid, who is visible, and who is left out.
Waste is one of the most visible environmental issues in Mongolia.
There is limited infrastructure, especially outside Ulaanbaatar. In many places, waste collection is basic or unavailable. Recycling exists, but it is inconsistent and often informal. Rubbish is sometimes burned or buried. Travellers notice it, and local communities live with it.
We cannot solve Mongolia’s waste challenges. But we can reduce what we add to them.
Our main actions include:
Responsible travel is not only about what happens in beautiful places. It is also about what we leave behind.
Mongolia is already being affected by climate change.
The annual mean air temperature has increased significantly over recent decades. Pastureland is under pressure. Lakes, rivers, springs, and glaciers are changing. Dry conditions can increase the risk of steppe and forest fires. Water resources are becoming more fragile.
For herding families, this has real consequences.
It affects pasture, movement, livestock health, income, and decisions about whether to stay in the countryside or move closer to towns and cities. These are the same families travellers often come to Mongolia hoping to meet.
As a tourism company, we have a responsibility to reduce what we can.
We are not currently publishing carbon measurements for our tours. But we are taking action in the areas we can influence:
We are not claiming to be a low-carbon company.
We are a small travel company trying to make lower-impact choices in a high-distance country.
Mongolia’s landscapes can look vast and resilient, but they are fragile.
Soil degradation, desertification, overgrazing pressure, water scarcity, climate change, and increasing tourism all affect the land. In some areas, the pressure is visible through vehicle tracks, rubbish, erosion, crowded viewpoints, damaged vegetation, and stress on local water sources.
Our approach is small-scale.
We keep our group sizes small. We limit the number of departures we offer. We avoid creating a constant tourism circuit through the same communities. We use Leave No Trace principles. We work with national park staff and local families. We encourage guests to walk carefully, camp respectfully, avoid damaging vegetation, and understand that landscapes are lived in, not empty spaces for travellers to consume.
We also support conservation and community projects where we can, including our annual national park community clean-up at Terkhiin Tsagaan Nuur National Park.
Our next steps are deliberately practical.
We want to keep reducing single-use plastic across our trips.
We want to improve how we track food waste, water use, and vehicle fuel use.
We want to keep reviewing which tours we offer and whether they still feel right for Mongolia, our team, and our local partners.
We want to continue linking this Climate Action Plan to our annual Impact Reports, so climate action is part of our wider responsibility rather than a separate marketing claim.
We want to move towards carbon measurement in the future, but only when we can do it properly.
And we want to remain open to advice, corrections, and support from people with more expertise than us.
This Climate Action Plan is a working document. It will change as we learn more, as Mongolia changes, and as our own work continues to evolve.
If you have insights or suggestions to help us improve, please don’t hesitate to reach out to Jess.
