Maropeng celebrates World Environment Day

This month marks the celebration of World Environment Day on June 5 and Maropeng would like to encourage you to take action in preserving the environment. According to the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), World Environment Day takes place annually and is “aimed at being the biggest and most widely celebrated global day for positive environmental action”.

With this in mind, Maropeng hopes that efforts to make our operations at the Cradle of Humankind World Heritage Site more environmentally friendly will inspire others in the tourism industry to do the same.

According to Maropeng’s maintenance manager, Mark Fouché, hundreds of trees were planted at the Visitor Centre when it opened in 2005. “We wrap all young trees in winter to help increase their chances of survival, but due to the extremely cold winters, only a few of these have survived. This is not due to failure on our part, but nature’s way of ensuring that only the strongest plants continue to reproduce.”

The 2011 theme for World Environment Day is “Forests: Nature at Your Service” which is fitting considering that according to Greenworks, deforestation is a major threat to the Earth’s existence. At Maropeng we are doing our part by annually planting indigenous trees for Arbor Day and focusing on conserving the surrounding natural environment.

Read more about the UNEP’s World Environment Day initiative and work together with your colleagues and friends to play your part in reducing carbon emissions.

Below is a list of trees which have been planted at Maropeng over the past five years:
• Acacia caffra, common hook thorn
• Acacia karroo, sweet thorn
• Celtis africana, white stinkwood
• Combretum erythrophyllum, river bushwillow
• Cussonia paniculata, mountain cabbage tree
• Euclea crispa, Guarris
• Kiggelaria africana, wild peach
• Olea europaea, African olive
• Rhus leptodictya, mountain karee
• Ziziphus mucronata, buffalo thorn