Laneo is gathering the world’s most inspired outdoor enthusiasts and a first-class network of corporations and mentors in one place, with one goal – putting sustainable projects for the planet into action. Designed for anyone who enjoys nature and wants to get involved, these hands-on eco-events will equip communities, organizations and like-minded companies to take action and spark real change. Participants work together to plan each event and spread the word through blogs, social networking, online tagging, photo sharing and more.
Visit http://camps.laneo.org/ for more details. Help us inspire a new generation of outdoor ambassadors!
Titled as the “World’s Most Challenging Human Endurance Competition”, PRIMAL QUEST is back for it’s 5th Edition in Montana (USA) this year, from June 21st – July 2nd.
Primal Quest was founded in 2001 with the goal of bringing a world-class, multi-sport expedition race to North America and it includes a mind boggling array of disciplines like navigation, climbing, paddling, biking, running, whitewater swimming and canyoneering over an incredible 5-10 day event.
One unique aspect is that this is an environmentally friendly, ecologically aware wilderness Expedition Adventure Race. Primal Quest is in full accordance with the United States Adventure Racing Association publication entitled “Adventure Racing Ecological Standards” and incorporates these standards in all phases of the planning, race management and post race activities. Teams only travel where permitted; do not build campfires; and strictly adhere to pack it in, pack it out rules. They also implement a recycle program for all their transition areas in order to minimize trash and landfill impact.
Origins of adventure racing date back to the 1980’s in New Zealand and became popular in the early 1990’s (I even met racers and organizers of the initial RAID GAULOISES races when I did Ironman NZ back in 1991) after which the concept became popular through the Raid Gauloises, Eco-Challenge and the BEAST of the East.
This is the type of outdoor event that gets us all excited at Laneo; really challenging, beautiful untouched landscapes, core teamwork skills and a “leave no trace” philosophy !
We just came across a very noble feat. 3 runners crossed the Sahara Desert for 110 days, running close to 2 marathons a day, in a journey for charity that’s been captured on film for a documentary called “Running the Sahara”.
All of us working at Laneo love the way outdoor activity brings us all closer to nature, especially when it mobilizes “commercial forces” to help restore and protect it.
One of the adventure’s goals was to help establish clean water wells for desert villagers the runners met along the way. The project was run under the umbrella of the “H2O Africa Foundation”, a charity and two major sponsors; Magellan and National Geographic. Alongside, a documentary film under the same name “Running the Sahara”, was shot and directed by James Moll, and produced and narrated by Matt Damon (Co-Founder of the H20 Foundation) which provided some very needed additional coverage.
We dug around for some additional information on the results of this quest and found the usual tidbits; if you find anything really interesting, please ping us at Laneo and we’ll publish it!
Degrading a protected site, polluting with waste, will soon be liable in the European Union to criminal sanctions, under a law passed by parliament yesterday.
“After eight years of negotiation, the European Parliament has reached an agreement with member states on legislation that will force national governments to apply criminal sanctions to those causing deliberate or negligent damage to the environment.”
With all the great initiatives currently happening on and offline (Laneo included) to promote a collective, citizen based, sense of urgency, a law like this could almost close the circle on improving the “management of our planet”; all that’s left is applying all these good resolutions…
Wired Magazine’s June issue “Inconvenient Truths: Get Ready to Rethink What It Means to Be Green”, will certainly raise a few eyebrows when it comes out next month.
This highly admired magazine has always taken the “out of the box” angle on a tremendous variety of subjects but this time, it’s journalists are tackling one of humanities current hot topics; the Planet.
Their point is that we should embrace change and actually “slaughter some of environmentalism’s sacred cows” such as a) accept genetic engineering, b) embrace nuclear power, c) A/C is ok and others in order to win the war on global warming.
We’re impatiently awaiting the issue to hit our news stands in Paris but whatever we read, we’ll continue to take our bikes to work, each local grown food and prefer sustainable products.
Climate Counts, a collaborative non-profit organization based in the USA, has just published its new Annual Scorecard that represents how serious companies are about stopping climate change – and how they compare to their sector competitors.
This annually updated scorecard reflects the self-reported efforts of companies to address climate change – or avoid it altogether.
This year in the “Apparel / Accessories” category, NIKE placed 1st with an overall score of 82/100. You can read more about their results (and even download the full report) here. What’s more important, you should raise your voice by sending a message to those companies that participate, via the online form that Climate Counts provides.
Nice to see citizen-based initiatives such as Climate Counts build greater awareness that when consumers take action and raise their voices on issues that matter to them, businesses pay attention.
At Laneo we love simple, fun and thought provoking websites especially those that grasp the potential of the web and what some call Web 2.0 (from Wikipedia: ” Web 2.0 is a term describing the trend in the use of World Wide Web technology and web design that aims to enhance creativity, information sharing, and, most notably, collaboration among users.”).
One of our favorite brands is PATAGONIA and we try and follow every initiative they launch and we especially liked last year’s launch of their so-called “FOOTPRINT CHRONICLES” which they describe as,
“The Footprint Chronicles is an interactive mini-site that allows you to track the impact of ten specific Patagonia products from design through delivery.”
What was deemed as “just a gimmick” from their detractors and competitors was shortsighted; this is a perfect example of how an easy to use tool that provides total visibility into a company’s’ sourcing and production can have a positive impact on not only the manufacturer itself but also, educate the consumer on their clothing and other purchases.
Patagonia went even farther and provided a feedback form that linked directly to their blog and provided them with the input to add, just recently, 5 new products from their spring 2008 lineup!
The point is, using the web to display meaningful metrics on a macro level and promoting user input can produce some big changes in corporate decision making and help steer us all to a cleaner future.
Today is Earth Day and Laneo teamed up with some good friends of ours, and renowned French Web Start-Up, MOOVEMENT (Recruiting 2.0), to promote human resources as a determining factor in sustainable development via a dedicated web recruiting site called, ECO-MOOVEMENT.
Richard Menneveux, Co-Founder, and I have often talked about this tirelessly and he has been a leading figure here in France and in Europe on improving the “match-making” between individuals and companies based on intrinsic personal values and innovative technology.
At Laneo, we’re still in the development phase and won’t be recruiting more than 4-5 additional people this year but when we do, we’re going to be looking for “special people” with not only business acumen; people who’s outdoor values match ours and who want to further the environmental cause.
Initiatives like MOOVEMENT are another great example at how leading edge web-based systems are helping bring the “right” people together that is going to make our place, planet earth, a better place to live!
For the 13th consecutive year our friends at SURFRIDER EUROPE held their annual “Ocean Initiatives” on March 21 thru 23rd all across Europe, mobilizing over 15,000 people to help cleanup beaches, lakes and rivers.
This year was again another success with over 335 cleanups taking place (260 of them in France) regardless of the terrible weather conditions across Europe throughout the weekend.
I’ve known Stephane Latxague, Director of Surfrider Europe for about 2 years and am really impressed with the work he and his team do year round walking the talk, teaching and motivating people tirelessly to restore and protect our Planet. It’s this kind of dedication that motivates us at Laneo to continue working hard to help teams like Surfrider Europe to enhance their operations and develop their impact.
Take a minute and checkout their dedicated site for this operation HERE (it’s in 6 languages and has loads of really interesting information, photos, videos, maps…).
Surfrider Foundation Europe works in conjunction with the other branches of Surfrider Foundation all around the world.
It’s that time of the year again when everyone makes their “New Year’s Resolutions” to start the year off on the “right foot”.
We don’t know where this tradition came from but it has spread across the world and become a ritual for everyone at any age. If you’re looking for some inspiration, here’s a selection of 5 of our “Top New Year Resolutions for 2008 for Laneo Headquarters in Paris”:
1) Run a Trail Event that has a “different” route than last year’s edition.
2) Purchase more than 80% of our Sports, Leisure and Business products & textiles that are eco-friendly (last year we achieved 68%).
3) Participate in at least 3 Cleanup Events and Run Laneo’s 1st Event.
4) Reduce the number of “Laneo’s Driven Kilometers” by 30% (last year was 2,332 kms)
5) Match our 2007 Goal; print only 1 Corporate Marketing document per year (last year, we did a bookmark for our prospects).
If you have some New Year resolution that you’d like to share, hit the “Comments” button below and tell everyone what you’re going to do this year.
Everyone at Laneo wishes you and your loved one’s a very Happy New Year !
For those of you scrambling around preparing for Christmas, I thought you wouldn’t mind having some helpful tips on making holiday festivities as eco friendly as possible. I asked some friends and Laneo Members from around the world to send me the URL’s of sites they thought provided some worthy advice.
Here’s a list 9 sites, in no particular order. If you have some of your own, please add them to the list via the comments.
Laneo is gathering the world’s most inspired outdoor enthusiasts and a first-class network of corporations and mentors in one place, with one goal – putting sustainable projects for the planet into action. Designed for anyone who enjoys nature and wants to get involved, these hands-on eco-events will equip communities, organizations and like-minded companies to take action and spark real change. Participants work together to plan each event and spread the word through blogs, social networking, online tagging, photo sharing and more.
Titled as the “World’s Most Challenging Human Endurance Competition”, 
We just came across a very noble feat. 3 runners crossed the Sahara Desert for 110 days, running close to 2 marathons a day, in a journey for charity that’s been captured on film for a documentary called “
Degrading a protected site, polluting with waste, will soon be liable in the European Union to criminal sanctions, under a 
At Laneo we love simple, fun and thought provoking websites especially those that grasp the potential of the web and what some call Web 2.0 (from 
Today is 
For the 13th consecutive year our friends at 
It’s that time of the year again when everyone makes their “New Year’s Resolutions” to start the year off on the “right foot”.
For those of you scrambling around preparing for Christmas, I thought you wouldn’t mind having some helpful tips on making holiday festivities as eco friendly as possible. I asked some friends and Laneo Members from around the world to send me the URL’s of sites they thought provided some worthy advice.
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