The Core
Mission and Vision, Values, and Sustainable Pledge.
Our Mission
Our mission is to empower, uplift, and unite communities globally, changing the old traditional and conservative ways of how to look at an issue, and giving an open-minded, progressive approach to reality today.
Our Vision
We dream of a planet protected and championed by millions of people. People work, collaborate and support sustainable projects to live in harmony with planet earth.
Our Values
It doesn't matter how much time you are spending on the earth, how much money you have collected, or how much attention you have received. What matters is the number of positive vibes that you have radiated in life.
Minimal, emancipated, and sustainable are some of the principal values that we carry in the philosophy of DDH, as we also support continuous evolution, innovation, growth and a global approach.
Here there are some values concepts we share among all of us:
Value Experiences
Life is made of meaningful experiences. Everyone can offer you something special anywhere in the world.
Keep Learning
The quest for knowledge is the most important thing you can carry, acquire and offer on your journey.
Share & Collaborate:
Everyone is responsible for the world's development as a whole. We are interdependent!
Conscious Consumerism:
Remember purchasing with thought and consideration when it is accessible to you. Conscious consumers are aware of the environmental and social impacts of their buying habits and try to make choices with the lowest negative impact.
Less & Tiny:
Fewer things, more multifunction. Tiny productions, tiny costs.
Our Sustainable Pledge
We solemnly swear to:
Preserve and conserve our natural resources, flora and fauna.
Reduce our impact on the environment.
Promote and preserve cultural heritage with respect and responsibility.
Develop tourism that improves the lives of the people it touches.
Make Responsible Travel a force for good in the world.
Local Communities
Travelling local is better for everyone involved, so wherever we can, we try to eat, stay and travel with local small businesses, not the big tourism chains. We respect our local friends and pay them fairly for their efforts.
Environment
We support a bunch of environmental campaigns to raise awareness in local schools. Our travellers get a chance to visit these communities on our trips, to give back, donate if they wish, and help out with tree-planting projects.
Cultural Heritage
We do make sure our travellers are educated about local cultures and respect them at all times. It’s our job as travellers to help preserve and honour these traditions, and we take that responsibility seriously.
Wildlife
We condemn the mistreatment of animals and ban exploitative tourism practices on our trips (no elephant-riding here). We also condemn the export, import and abuse of endangered species.
Recycling and Waste
It’s no longer enough to say ‘I didn’t know’ when it comes to waste management. We know how plastic can damage the environment, which is why we provide our travellers with cloth sacks for trash and other waste during the trip. Plastic and glass bottles are collected separately and recycled after the Challenge is over. Smokers are encouraged to butt out properly, and we recycle in our offices back home. Green and proud, baby.
Merchandising
The event bags we hand our travellers are hand-made with local materials and printed with bio-degradable inks (when possible).
Accommodation
We make sure we source eco-friendly hotels wherever we can, and our campsites are all set up in approved areas.
Printing
We don’t print in the workplace unless it’s absolutely necessary. When we do print, we only use FSC certified recycled paper. This applies to our brochures, business cards and all other bits of collateral.
Water
It’s thirsty work, adventuring. So we encourage our travellers to minimise their use of plastic water bottles wherever they can and bring along re-usable alternatives (or a purification tablet, if that’s your thing).
Flagship Projects
It’s part of the deal as soon as you click ‘Sign me up. Let’s do this.’ When you post a Journey, 10% of your trip price is automatically donated to our flagship projects in the country you’ve picked to visit. And there’s more too. You’ll actually get to stop-in and see these projects on the ground. You’ll meet the kids, learn a bit about the community initiative and understand exactly where your money went. Cue the warm and fuzzy feels.
When picking these foundation projects, we put a big emphasis on education. We don’t want to get all Presidential about this, but we really believe the kids are our future. We really think travel can make the world a better place, and to do that we’ve focused our meaningful travel efforts on three main areas: environment, learning resources and leisure activities.
Money
DDH is a Smart Activity registered in Belgium. DDH’s projects focus on fixing problems, not generating profit. DDH counts on money from donations, Patreon and sporadically grants and paid projects. As well as selling products that contribute and are aligned to our values.
The money is invested in research and development of new projects, paying for our costs (workspaces, bills, travel etc..) and paying our staff (trying to reach Belgian minimum wage). We like to stay transparent as much as possible, every year we share a financial report with a breakdown of expenditures.
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