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Absa celebrates Arbor Month
Absa Group environmental community officers (GECO) and the business banking debt sales team will celebrate Arbor Month by planting 50 fruit and indigenous trees in collaboration with Food & Trees for Africa at the Mofolo Home Based Care Centre, as well as the Phakamane and Vukusenzele Primary Schools in Soweto near Johannesburg.
The event will be held at the Mofolo Home Based Care Centre on 20 September.
"The Absa GECO team is looking forward to another year of our volunteers working with Food & Trees for Africa to plant trees in areas that need them the most," says Colin White GECO team leader. "We are passionate about leaving things better than when we found them through supporting our communities to expand their green spaces. Our hope is that the trees planted this year assist in supplementing the food supply and beautifying the grounds of these organisations."
For the past ten years Mofolo Home Based Care Centre has been caring for orphans and people with incurable diseases. Their ethos, 'Caring for the sick' arose out of the need to work with vulnerable groups as hospitals and clinics could not cope with social problems within the community. The school plantings will take place on the same day and involve learners and educators alike in the rewarding activity of planting trees.
Events draw attention
"These plantings offer endless opportunities for environmental and climate change education," says Jeunesse Park, African branch manager for Al Gore's Climate Reality Project and founder of Food & Trees for Africa. "Our ecopreneurs use these events to draw attention to issues like soil erosion, the carbon and water cycles, extreme weather events, biodiversity and food security, and emphasise the theme for this year's Arbor celebrations, 'Forests are our Future'."
The Absa GECO trees have been plotted on the Trees for Africa Arbor Challenge regisTREE where photographs and commentary will be added after the plantings. These trees are some of the 10 000 that Food & Trees for Africa will be planting with help from many partners this Arbor Month.
"Whilst every month is Arbor Month for us, this is an important time of year to raise awareness of the vital role that trees play in our lives," says Park. "Partners like the team from Absa GECO, who have planted with us every September for the past five years, are helping marginalised communities to not only improve lives and landscapes, but respond to the devastating effects of climate change."
