Visit Svalbard is proud to have Longyearbyen labelled as a Sustainable Destination. The label scheme, which is owned by Innovation Norway, has been an important tool for the destination company Visit Svalbard, the local companies and the wider destination in working seriously towards sustainability and improving sustainability in the local tourism industry – day by day and year by year. Having this prestigious label does not necessarily mean that we are sustainable, but it commits us to focus on sustainability.
Read more about how we work with sustainability here.
Visit Svalbard held the label from 2016 to 2019. Achieving this label is a demanding job that requires resources in terms of both labour and funding. The same goes for the re-labelling process, which we had planned to implement in 2019. Unfortunately, we were unable to secure the funding required to implement this before the deadline for re-labelling had passed. This was further compounded by Covid-19, which created further challenges. Consequently, as of 2020, we were no longer part of the label scheme.
However, with new grants and a reinforced team in 2021, we were able to initiate the re-labelling process. Visit Svalbard and Longyearbyen were re-labelled as a Sustainable Destination in 2022, meaning we are once again part of the important cooperation towards sustainability that the label represents.
Focusing on sustainability is focusing on the future and, in the recovery of our destination following the devastating effects of the Covid-19 pandemic, the re-labelling will play a key role in putting sustainability on the agenda as we seek to resume the positive development that Svalbard’s tourism industry experienced before the onset of Covid-19.
Visit Svalbard encourages local companies to undergo environmental certification as an important part of our sustainability policy. We have gained environmental certification, as have several of our member companies. Please scroll down to read about these environmentally certified companies.
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