“If you only focus on material flows and make that excellent, and don’t think about biodiversity or energy or people who are living there, you’re creating the next problem.” – Hanneke Schmeink, Circular Friesland Association.

In recent years, circular economies have become a hot topic in sustainability discussions. But have you ever wondered how these innovative systems can shape a region’s relationship with tourism? In this episode of Travel Beyond, we embark on a journey to Friesland, a province in the Netherlands, where we meet some passionate locals eager to showcase their vision of sustainability to visitors.

In this episode, you’ll gain insight into the world of circular economies and their profound impact on both tourism and the environment. Join us as we converse with Hanneke Schmeink from the Circular Friesland Association, Linda Limburg from De Laape, and Roger Davids from Merk Fryslân, the province’s destination management organization.

In this episode, you’ll learn about:

• How circular economies mean a lot more than reducing waste. 
• Collaboration and setting up environments for entrepreneurs.
• Travel as a tool for education.
• All about bug hotels.

Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favourite podcast player to join us on this journey.

Show notes

Circular Friesland Association – Aims to be the most circular region in the EU in 2025.

De Laape – A former farm turned meetings and event space that is close to nature. 

Merk Fryslân – The destination management organization for the Friesland region. 

Episode transcript

Sara Raymond de Booy: Hey, it’s Sara. Right now, we’re listening in as Rodney takes a tour of De Laape, a prized example of how circular economy principles come to life for tourism in the Netherlands.

 It’s located in Friesland, about 90 minutes drive from Amsterdam. The property is an old farm with a canal running through it that’s been rebuilt for the business events market. It’s designed in a way where the benefits of nature can really enrich creativity for urban dwellers. 

Linda Limburg: My name is Linda Limburg and we are at de Lappe in Friesland.

At de Laape it’s not only the buildings that are built sustainable and circular, it’s also the terrain. So around the whole terrain, there are little bug hotels. I think you call them.

Rodney Payne: Bug hotel? Okay. 

Linda Limburg: You’ve never heard of it?

Rodney Payne: I’ve never heard of a bug hotel. 

Linda Limburg: Oh this is a bug hotel. It’s for insects. And mouses can live there, and birds. 

Rodney Payne: Yeah, I like that you put a roof on it to keep them dry too. 

Linda Limburg: I’m going to take you to the greenhouses. And the idea behind the greenhouses is, we’re in nature. And if you’re in the greenhouse, you’re still in nature, but with a roof, with walls. Because… If it rains here, and it’s windy, so if you’re in the greenhouse, it’s nice and warm.

The temperature here is just from the sun of today. 

Rodney Payne: What does this space get used for? 

Linda Limburg: It’s for the business market, so brainstorms, multiple day events, because people can also stay overnight here. Just business meetings. This used to be chicken and sheep farm. So the greenhouses are in the contours of the old chicken sheds.

So this used to be a chicken shed, and that also. It was empty for a long time and it needed to be converted to something that could be used again. And now it’s used for the business market. 

So we collect the rainwater from the roof and it’s also a natural filter. So the rainwater would be also filtered, through the roof. And we catch it in really big tanks of 7,500 liters, I think. And we flush the toilets with it. 

Rodney Payne: The drums that you collect the rainwater in, are they all underneath? 

Linda Limburg: No, there are two. So each greenhouse has its own tank. And it runs with pipes to one and the same tank. And if the tank is full, it runs to the water behind you. 

Rodney Payne: Yeah, it’s really beautiful. 

And all built relatively sustainable and all rebuilt recently. 

Linda Limburg: Yes, it’s all reused. We won’t throw anything away. So we store everything because there’s always a new place for it.

Sara Raymond de Booy: So on this episode of Travel Beyond, we headed north to Friesland in the Netherlands, a region where circular economy principles are really gaining traction. And they’re one of the few regional DMOs who have signed the Glasgow Declaration. In this episode, we’re going to dive into how sustainability is part of their DNA, how that relates to the larger plan for the Netherlands, and speak to two experts who are passionate about making this little corner of Europe a little better for residents and visitors alike.

Now, circular economy is a term you might be hearing about a little more lately, but to get a better sense of the value it can bring to tourism and hospitality, Rodney sat down with Hanneke Schmeink of Circular Friesland.

Hanneke Schmeink: I’m Hanneke Schmeink and I work for Circular Friesland.

Rodney Payne: What is Circular Friesland? 

Hanneke Schmeink: Circular Friesland is an association in Friesland from a governmental organisation, entrepreneurs, and all those institutions who are working together to make Friesland more circular. 

Rodney Payne: So within Circular Friesland, you have a very specific focus. What’s your role? 

Hanneke Schmeink: My role, especially make connections by what’s going on in Circular Friesland. Like we have a major program on bio-based building. How can farmers do several other things, rebuild for isolation materials. And I try to connect it to the hospitality sector. What are the investments and innovations you can use in the hospitality sector?

 I’m working now two years on the projects. And Circular Friesland started in 2016. There were about 20-25 entrepreneurs that said, if we want to go to a circular system, we need each other. We need to cooperate more. And they developed, and the association developed now to 130 people and associations, which also includes the governmental organization, all the knowledge institutes. We call it triple helix. I’m not sure that’s a common word. But we need each other if we want to change the system. We need to cooperate on several levels with each other. And I try to connect the hospitality sector to it. 

Circular is a big word with a lot of definitions, but in Friesland, we take a broad approach of it, that we say it’s a way to make a sustainable world together, and we design or we base it on the seven pillars of circular economy. 

Rodney Payne: And what are those pillars?

Hanneke Schmeink: The pillars are material flows connected, uh, water, energy, human beings’ sustainability of health, bio diversity, cultural inheritance, and also, that  I don’t know the English word for it, but that you see money as a way to do the good things.

 Earning money is necessary. You need a good business model to be circular, but it’s not to do it only to get more money for yourself. Let’s do good things with it. 

When a lot of people hear the word circular economy, they probably think about materials and reducing waste, but you think a lot more broadly about it. 

Yeah, it’s a big part of it, reduce of waste. It’s a big thing, but it’s also the thing is, if you like, like energy, if we focus only on energy and forget all the rest. We are making the next problem. So you have to look at integral in a broad approach. Otherwise, if you only focus on material flows, and make that excellent, and don’t think about biodiversity or energy or people who are living there, you’re creating the next problem. 

Rodney Payne: Collaboration is a really Important theme as we think about new ways of living and connecting with each other. Can you talk about why that’s important?

Hanneke Schmeink: More than in the linear system, you need each other. If a product of a service is end of life, you need to do something with it. So you have to, at the beginning, start, have to think, Oh, what am I going to do at the end of life?

So you need to collaborate more make the circle connected. And get it in a circular way. And that’s why it’s more important. If you make a product in a linear economy, you try to sell your product and then you think forget about it. I don’t want to see it ever again. But now you have to recollect it and do smart things with it.

So you need a lot of people involved.

Rodney Payne: Can you tell us a little bit about where we’re sitting, and where we’re talking, and De Laape and the space that we’re in?

Hanneke Schmeink: Yeah, De Laape is in a place in Friesland, in the middle of Friesland. It’s an old farm. Get bulldozer through it. And that’s the end of the old farm. 

And they rebuilt the whole thing on a really circular way. Not only materials, but also the biodiversity. It’s really thought through in the whole area grounds.

They have their own grocery, they grow products they use in their menus for the visitors. The toilets are flushed by rainwater, so they really sort it out for, how can we do it on a more circular way.

Rodney Payne: I know one of the Important things behind the vision for De Laape is to help people leave changed and to leave a little bit educated. You work in the hospitality sector helping to think about how the circular economy applies to tourism. What do you think the opportunity is for tourism in the circularity economy?

Hanneke Schmeink: As you mentioned, it’s a great opportunity because in the hospitality branch, we’re not really making stuff. So in the circular economy, we’re not one of those chain partners. It’s incredibly important to get people experience of new materials, new ways of life. And if they experience it, they bring this new experience with them to home. 

So if they stay, for example, in a bio based building and they experience the inside climate, what it’s doing to them, and they have to rebuild their own building at home, I’m sure they’ll think it over. And the good thing, if you’re on your holiday time, you’re more open for new experiences.

While at home, you’re busy with your kids, with your work, you’re not interested in it. But on a holiday time, you think, oh. That’s interesting. I would like to know more about it. 

Rodney Payne: And how has the hospitality sector sort of received the circular direction? Are they embracing it? Are they interested?

Hanneke Schmeink: Yeah it was a bit of work, I must be honest, but I think that’s the good thing in Friesland. We work really together. So we have the TAF, Tourisme Allianz Friesland, who is working with entrepreneurs. So they are telling them, oh, are you working on it? Maybe I have something interesting for you.

Go to Circular Friesland, go to Hanneke, ask what’s going on. We’ve got Merk Fryslân, who is really promoting Friesland. And all together, we try to reach all the several players in the field, and try to connect them.

Rodney Payne: 

Hanneke Schmeink: The good thing is that Brand Friesland, we call it Merk Fryslân, also has a sustainable program, which is really adapted to the way we work with the Action Plan Circular Hospitality. They also try on the seven pillars, what can we do and how can we brand Friesland on the way and make it more work. And one of the things with entrepreneurs, but also campaigns, how you show it to your visitors what they can do. 

And one of the things is what we are really working on, what’s really tricky, that in the Visit Wadden, which is the branding organization for the Wadden area, how can we visitors attend to more sustainable opportunities in that area?

 So it’s quite a challenge to show that the entrepreneurs who are really doing well, but sometimes too polite, too shy, they don’t shout it from the roof, what they actually should do. And so it’s normal, and I said, oh, no, it’s not normal. It’s quite incredible what you’re doing. So please show it to us, to your visitors, so they can know it. 

Rodney Payne: Do you have a good example of how a business has embraced some aspects of the circular economy?

Hanneke Schmeink: Yeah, we have several projects to set entrepreneurs on a different level of thinking. And one of them is a Circle Track. It’s a three days track where we help to redesign a circular model in the organization. And there’s one entrepreneur, and he really wanted to change his decks.

What is the most sustainable thing I can put in there? And he said, hold on, there’s something going out. And what are you doing with it? And he said, I’m just the organization who brings it in, takes it with him. I said, that’s too easy. Because probably the wood on the waterline is probably rotten, but below and above it’s probably still good wood. Can you do something else with it? 

So that was his homework in this track, to think it over, what are you going to do with it? And finally he came back and said, that was quite a good question of you, because we took it all out, we sold some, building wood, burning wood, and also we gave it to some organization to use it in the gardens, and it saved me about 8,000 euros for the organization who had to bring it out.

So it saves him money in his whole project, but also it made him thinking of another way of what is going on in my organization. And that’s what we remark in all the projects we’re doing, we also help entrepreneurs to come to get the Green Key certificates, which is quite a bit of a paperwork and entrepreneurs are not really wanted to do that sometimes as well.

Rodney Payne: We make it nicer and easier. It’s a really good example. It’s such a simple example that we often think so much about using more sustainable materials or goods. And we think less about where things are going and if they still have some use left in their life. 

Hanneke Schmeink: Also there’s still a lot of food waste in restaurants. And of course we are looking a lot of them, how can you reduce it? Can you change your menu card, or can you do a different buying to reduce your waste? But you always keep waste. And one of the organizations, he was also in the mindset, how can I do different?

And he collected now in a sort of small bio digester his food waste from the kitchen. Leftovers is going in there. They make their own gas out of it, and they used to do the laundry in their own company. And they still have digestive aid, and they use it in their garden, which they also make flowers, and they put it on the table.

And they bring this story to their guests and they’re always surprised. So actually the flowers are growing on your own food waste. 

Rodney Payne: When I hear you talk, I hear you talk about a lot of benefits for thinking differently and doing things differently. Do you often see that small changes in one area actually lead to a cascade of benefits? 

Hanneke Schmeink: I think if you focus on what’s going wrong and we can’t change it, we’re never gonna change it. So I set the goal high. We want to be circular, but we have to make small changes already to get ourselves on to do a different way. And I think if you make it smart and practical, the entrepreneur is willing to do it and the customer as well. If you make it smart, practical, he wants to join it and make the difference. I

Rodney Payne: I really like the way that you describe the travel experience as a way to experience new ways of living and doing things. Do you think we have to travel across the world for that to be true?

Hanneke Schmeink: That’s a tricky one because on one hand to say because of sustainability, no, stay closer but on the other hand, if I look at my own life, the experience I have abroad has made me the person I am now. I’ve seen different ways, different lifestyles and also see some less nice things.

So it made me as a person, I think if you only stay in your own comfortable zone, you don’t experience it. It’s making more impact in your mind, so you’re not willing to change a lot of things. I would suggest everybody to travel, because new experience gives you new insights and makes your life richer and more impactful.

Rodney Payne: If you imagine 10 years from now in Friesland, and you’ve been working hard with a thousand entrepreneurs for all of that time. What does it look like? How does the economy here work? And what impact have you had?

Hanneke Schmeink: My, my biggest aim would be that, that I won’t be necessary anymore. It is just a normal way of entrepreneurship. And I think that’s the thing we should aim, that it is normal to be aware of all the things of circularity, to do it in a different way. And I think we are planting seeds now to do it that way.

 And some entrepreneurs or visitors are growing faster, because I’m talking a lot about entrepreneurs, but the visitors have their own responsibility in this. I can’t worry. I hear complaining from entrepreneurs that I want to do on waste collection and several waste bins, but visitors are just not doing it. They just throw it in one bin. 

So we all have to change on that level, on that part. And I think if you make it 10 years that we’re all aware and trying to do better. I’m not saying, it’s good, but try to do better then it would be a good thing.

Rodney Payne: You’re doing very important work, and I want you to get back to it with all the urgency. Thank you for sitting down with us and talking today. It’s been really inspiring, but go back to work because we need more of you.

Hanneke Schmeink: Thank you very much. And we need more of all of it. The awareness is good.

Sara Raymond de Booy: As Hanneke mentions, the Circular Friesland organization has a close relationship with Merk Fryslân, essentially the local DMO. While Circular Friesland might be encouraging and facilitating entrepreneurship in the area, it’s the DMO who tries to bring visitors in to learn more about it. Like with so many other discussions we’ve had in the Netherlands about Perspective 2030, defining a visitor of value is a theme that emerges here again.

To dig into this more, Rodney grabbed a beer with Roger Davids, a strategic advisor with Merk Fryslân, to see what the future of sustainable travel might look like when you look at it through the unique perspective of this region.

Roger Davids: I’m Roger Davids, and I’m responsible for strategy and research at Merk Fryslân, which is the destination management organization of our province of Friesland.

Rodney Payne: And can you tell me a little bit about the destination?

Roger Davids: It’s a beautiful destination, and especially I think because of the landscape you have a lot of space over here. Compared to beautiful cities like Amsterdam or Rotterdam or The Hague. But it’s very nearby. The water sports is developing very well. And traveling by bike or by feet is amazing over here.

And we’ve got the only UNESCO World Heritage in the Netherlands, the Wadden Sea area. Which is a very interesting area to visit.

Rodney Payne: And you’ve done a lot in tourism in your career. Can you tell me a little bit about your journey and what you’ve done?

Roger Davids: I was the owner of a marketing agency where we, I think we worked for more than 30 regions, mostly in the Netherlands. Bigger cities, but also regions like Friesland, other provinces. Where we first started working for brands, we noticed when we worked for region that was a total other approach needed. So we thought, why is this campaign not working? And then we understood that it’s a brand with without owner everybody is owner. We really had to think about how to restructure the marketing of a destination. 

So instead of making a campaign, you give people a tool or tooling by which they can promote the destination. And they want to be an ambassador. So that’s, in a small recap, what we learned after doing this a few times totally wrong.

And then we enjoyed it a lot, because if you have a lot of stakeholders, like in Friesland, you have to make choices how to position in your region. So you cannot tell everything. Because then if you confuse them, you lose them, and you lose your positioning. And if you don’t have a strong positioning you cannot market it very well.

So that was yeah, very interesting. And by doing this also a few times in a successful way. We got new cases and, and that’s how I was invited to look at a new strategy for the marketing of the tourism part of Friesland. I think that was 2016.

Rodney Payne: And so you’ve been in your role here in Friesland for seven years? 

Roger Davids: Yeah. 

Rodney Payne: And where do you see destination marketing and sustainability come together? How do you think about those two things?

Roger Davids: I think it comes together when you are not only looking at the economic part. It comes together when you think we are marketing for visitors, and how do the inhabitants and nature prosper?

So I think that’s where it meets and it becomes a more sustainable way, more valuable way of marketing, not only valuable into dollars. Or here in Europe, euros, but you also look at the well being of nature, which is very important for a part like Friesland, we’ve got a lot of beautiful nature over here. And we also have a very strong culture in this province.

So you also have to look how the inhabitants prosper from tourism. And in every decision we make, we have to think about if it’s valuable enough to get more visitors to your province. And I think that’s where it meets each other. 

Rodney Payne: What benefits can tourism bring beyond money?

Roger Davids: I think if we wouldn’t have tourism in Friesland, then how many supermarkets would we have in the smaller cities? How many people would have a health service in their neighborhood? So I think that’s what we are not counting at the moment very often. But I think this is very valuable for the inhabitants of Friesland, that tourism brings them extra services. And I think if we look at the very valuable way of visiting our province, it also learns people more about nature. So I think this is what we really should focus on. So that’s why I think it not only brings us an economic value. 

Rodney Payne: How is nature intertwined with the Friesland brand?

Roger Davids: It’s, well, we call it the Friesland style. So we show people how they can love cows, for example, and that’s the sort of way we showed the landscape, so people can think now I’m living in a city, for example, and my neighbor is two meters right from me and six meters to the left of me, and in Friesland I’ve got all the space so I can get new energy. So I think it’s a good way to show them how they can get energy in in Friesland and with a lot of space to enjoy, which they cannot experience anymore in the crowded cities. 

Rodney Payne: We drove over a very long seawall to get to Friesland and it was a, it’s quite a, an amazing feat of engineering, and half of the Netherlands is quite low.

Roger Davids: Yeah. Half of Friesland wouldn’t be there if we wouldn’t have that that sort of techniques.

Rodney Payne: There’s a lot of talk of rising sea levels and changing climate. Do you think people are worried? Is it in the consciousness of people?

Roger Davids: I think if you would compare the Frisian with other provinces, I think they are much more aware of this. For example, the UNESCO World Heritage Wadden Sea. If the sea level is rising, this gives us a lot of problems for the birds, et cetera.

So I think a lot of people are really aware of this and also that, that it will change the landscape a lot, and not only because then you would have some problems with your house or something, but I think they are sensitive on this on a more broader sense. I’m sure.

Rodney Payne: The Netherlands has a new strategy for tourism. And it’s bold and different and focuses on balancing the economic benefit with the social impacts and benefits of tourism and environmental impacts. What do you think of the new strategy?

Roger Davids: We think that we are very happy with this new approach.

And also because it shows that we are not only marketing for getting more tourists, but we need more valuable tourists. And to have this discussion because in the Netherlands, we are living on a worldwide scale. We are living with a lot of people in a very small area. So this is a very important discussion, how to use that area. And so I think it’s very valuable that we have a new approach. That’s the first thing. 

And the second thing is that we have a discussion not only on marketing, but also on what kind of valuable tourism we want to develop and how we can monitor it on a valuable way. So it, it has broadened from marketing to valuable development of tourism and also monitoring.

So we are very happy that we have a sort of understanding on a national scale how to approach this. And because it’s a new approach, last years and the upcoming years we will need to experience how to work together to get this new approach successful.

Rodney Payne: What makes a valuable tourist?

Roger Davids: I think when it’s valuable for the inhabitants and nature. And of course it has to be also a valuable asset economically. But before you look at the economic part, first ask yourself, is it interesting for the inhabitants to have more visitors in wintertime, for example, or in another time where it’s not high season.

And why is it valuable? Is it valuable because they visit the supermarket, and normally it’s closed in wintertime and now it’s still open. Then I don’t have to drive by bicycle – because we are all driving by bicycle in the Netherlands – five kilometers. No, it’s 500 meters from my house.

So that’s, that sort of services, health services. If we can keep a doctor in your small village, because he can also, or she can also work for the for the visitors, then it’s valuable for the inhabitants. For example, three years ago, we did our first research on how the inhabitants are thinking about tourism, which was quite interesting for us because it was the first time we asked them this sort of questions.

Do you value tourism, and why not? And, and now next summer we will do a new research so we can monitor if, if it’s changing. And most important is if it’s changing, we really think together with all the stakeholders, how to get more value from the visitors. And the same is on nature.

So we have a beautiful landscape, but the biodiversity is not on every spot on the same level anymore. For example, a lot of birds flew over the Wadden Sea to eat, and we see that we have some problems in some areas. So we have to discuss with the nature organizations how to manage that that we still can have visitors at some months, or at some areas, and how we can work together. And so I think it’s important to have a good discussion between those stakeholders to, to look at the most valuable way of getting the visitors at the right time, at the right spot.

Rodney Payne: The Netherlands tourism strategy explores what it might be to be a regenerative tourism system and starts with decarbonization first and aligns to national legislation around decarbonization. There’s not that many people really thinking or talking about tourism’s impact on climate. What do you think of that?

Roger Davids: If you think about the next generation, that they own the system, we are not owning the system.

We think we are owning it because we are, at the moment, the CEO or the boss or something like that. But we own the destination for our children. So I think our children own the destination, not we, so if you think that way on a destination, then the decisions you make are more valuable.

You just consider it on a different perspective. And in Friesland, we have a lot of circular and sustainable initiatives, not because we only want to be sustainable, but a lot of people in Friesland look at the future for their children more, they are more aware of this.

Rodney Payne: What behavior change is needed?

Roger Davids: You have to be aware, because otherwise I don’t have to talk with you. If you’re not aware that we are destroying our Earth, you are not aware, and you are still saying that it’s just a period for 40 years, 100 years. And we own the problem. So that’s the first thing.

So I think we still have to make a lot of people aware of the problem. That’s where we start. And I think if we manage, that firstly five percent and then in the end 20, 25 percent, in my opinion, the system goes in the right direction.

And at the moment, I think in the Netherlands, we are heading for that five to 10 percent of people that are really aware. And I hope that in Friesland, we show how to do this. We are not at that that stage at the moment but, for example, we signed the Glasgow Declaration and at the moment I believe we are the only regional destination management organization who did sign it, but there will be more in the next year. So I think if we show how to deal with it then we will motivate also others. Firstly in Friesland, but hopefully also in other regions in Europe, in the Netherlands, how to deal with it. And we can learn a lot from other regions. We are not the only ones that are exploring this. Because it’s an exploration, because to be honest, we also are looking, what role can we take as a destination management organization to be effective? And what role do we ask the government? Can they focus on the right themes? Not only the regional government, but also the local government, because they are the ones that can look at a certain focus and then organizations like Merk Fryslân, they have to do the work together with the other stakeholders to get a more sustainable form of tourism.

Rodney Payne: In destination marketing, we have a lot of influence. We tell stories and we help people to have different experiences. What role do you think our industry can play in helping to accelerate the tipping point that you describe?

Roger Davids: In the end, I think we have to show. So firstly, I was talking about awareness and how we can show people what kind of interest they have in doing this more sustainable. And I think if we show them by piloting how this works, then I think, step by step, a lot of people we can motivate them to follow these sort of examples.

So I think firstly, we have to show, for example, that we market in the, not in the high season so that other DMOs say why are you not marketing and that we get a discussion but on another level, here we are in a place, de Laape, which shows how to have another business model as a farmer.

I think it’s important that we show, for example, the governments, how we work together with agro tourism. How we work together with farms, how does this work? How can we work together with the cultural partners? How can we work together with technical partners? We have lots of technology. 

I think it’s interesting that we develop a sort of business visitors, where we show them how good we are at sustainable water technology, sustainable agriculture on sustainable plastics, et cetera, et cetera. And if we can have interesting conventions about these strong themes in Friesland, a lot of people in Friesland themselves will think, I can still stay in Friesland, because it’s a war on talent, in Europe, in the Netherlands. So we want to have not only the theoretical students, but also the practical students.

Rodney Payne: In a community or a destination that has collective thinking and environmental consciousness in its DNA, how do you reconcile those values with the priorities of business stakeholders who need more tourists and maybe have come through COVID right? There’s that very difficult tension to manage in your role and for your organization. How do you think about that?

Roger Davids: I think it’s important to sit on the same table. And then in this region, I think a lot of people will come up with a sort of same strategy. And of course, if you are an entrepreneur, you also look at the economic part, which is also important, but not only at the economic part. So I think it’s important to get them together, and with a starting point of a few entrepreneurs and a few people in the government.

You have to start with a group which is showing how to deal with it. And in my opinion, if you have a region where you have a strong leadership which develops enough serious pilots and serious best practices, then I think you, you get a lot of people motivated to follow.

Sara Raymond de Booy: This has been Travel Beyond presented by Destination Think, and you just heard from Linda Limburg at De Laape, Hanneke Schmeink from the Circular Friesland Association, Roger Davids with Merk Fryslân, and the bugs, vacationing in the bug hotels. We’ll include links to more resources on the blog for this episode at destinationthink. com. 

This episode has been produced and has theme music composed by David Archer. Lindsay Payne, Annika Rautiola, and myself, Sara Raymond de Booy, provided production support. We would like to thank NBTC, the Netherlands Board of Tourism and Conventions, for their support in creating this podcast season with us and for sharing their vision with all of you.

You can help more people find this show by subscribing to future episodes and by leaving a rating and review. On our next and final episode of the Netherlands series, we’re wrapping up by speaking with a few organizations, putting theory into practice and providing solutions that will help NBTC’s plan come to life. See you then.