We encourage all businesses working in the snowsports industry to join this campaign, organised by the lobbying group Protect Our Winters, asking policy makers to catch up and produce policies that support increased sustainability while penalising bad practices.

These demands will be presented in an open letter to European policy makers ahead of COP27. A copy of the letter is shown below. Your organisation can sign and join this campaign here.

The outdoor industry demands bold action from COP27

As representatives of the European outdoor industry we’re already taking bold action to reduce our impact – but we need stronger policy support to do more. 

Right now, companies that take action to reduce their impact are at a disadvantage in the market. As delegations from around the world meet in Sharm El-Sheikh for COP27, we believe it’s the right time to address the issue.

Why? The conference’s theme this year is loss and damage – and our industry is already seeing climate change’s effects. We’ve seen shorter winters, melting glaciers, droughts and floods. We’re losing green and blue spaces. Local communities are being devastated. And biodiversity is dwindling rapidly.

This isn’t about the effects on our industry of losing outdoor spaces. It’s about climate breakdown threatening our entire way of life.

Why does the outdoor industry need to act?

We’re a strong sector in an uncertain world. Our industry expects a consumer base of 195 million people by 2025 and a wholesale value of over 6 billion Euros. Our impacts are global, with over 80% of our emissions outside the EU – so we can only tackle our climate footprint by acting globally.

Our industry is already embracing existing legislation – but we need stronger policy to restrict heating to +1.5°C. We’ve identified three outcomes we need from COP27:

1. Incentivise the increased sustainability of business practices.

We need legislation that encourages industries to choose sustainable options over growth at all costs. This means offering incentives for businesses to create built-to-last products, offer repair services, support second hand options, provide rental programs and more. We need to give companies compelling reasons to choose business models that reduce emissions and encourage their customers to reduce their consumption.

2. Standardise measurements for products’ environmental impact.

Currently businesses can use a variety of methods to calculate the embodied carbon emissions of their products and choose which sustainability standards to apply. This makes it almost impossible for anyone – business or consumer – to compare products against each other. It also means regulators can’t incentivise products with lower emissions and better sustainability attributes or discourage less sustainable products with higher emissions. We need standard, mandatory ways of measuring these.

3. Help businesses move to renewable energy for manufacturing.

We need to incentivise renewable energy to accelerate manufacturing – and this needs to be done fairly for the emerging and lower-income economies where so many outdoor businesses manufacture. This means offering the support these countries need to move to lower carbon energy sources. Businesses which choose renewable energy to manufacture shouldn’t be at a market disadvantage compared to those who use fossil fuels. 

How can the outdoor industry help?

We want to help policy makers reach our climate goals – but we need their help to do it. We’re ready and willing to work together, and we want to keep on advocating for strong, practical and pragmatic policy.

Members of the outdoor industry have been working hard to improve how we do business, but we need policies that both support positive action and penalise harmful practices. We’re ambitious, we’re ready to collaborate and we want to push the agenda. Now is the time to create the policies to let us do it. We the undersigned demand maximum ambition from those negotiating at COP27 that matches the scale of the climate crises we are all facing.