A PLETHORA of vegetation is spreading its roots in local soil after thousands of trees were planted in Athlone to raise environmental awareness.

The Cancer Association of South Africa, the Hospice Palliative Care Association of South Africa and Food & Trees for Africa are better off to the combined tune of R290,800 thanks to the City Lodge Hotels group and its guests.

Food & Trees for Africa’s (FTFA) Bamboo for Africa programme has been certified under the Verified Carbon Standard (VCS)—the first VCS accreditation for bamboo in the world. 

Breaking new ground is nothing new for a logistics company that is used to going the extra mile. What is new is EQSTRA FLEXI LOGISTICS (EFL) Bamboo Carbon Offset Project, the first of its kind in South Africa.

Starting from 30 January, EduPlant, the national programme that teaches educators, learners and communities how to sustainably grow their own food, will be rolling out 45 workshops across all nine provinces.  The workshops will teach participants permaculture gardening methods as a viable means of addressing food security in South Africa.

Demand spurs Climate Change Leadership Awards deadline extension

The Climate Change Leadership Awards (CCLA) has extended its closing date for entries from 31 January 31 to 10 February to allow for the uptake in environmental activity surrounding COP17.

Roses, chocolates and cards with teddy bears on them?

While there is nothing wrong with the conventional image of Valentine’s Day that February 14th conjures up, isn’t it time we really thought about what a day of sharing love should be all about and give a gift that won’t land up in a dusty box on a shelf somewhere a few months hence?

In April 2011 The Nontsikelelo Drop in Centre approached SCAW Metals for support in a greening initiative at their grounds in Wattville, Gauteng.

The Nontsikelelo Centre comprises of an adult centre, a clinic (which is not operational at the moment), a computer centre as well as the drop in centre where 307 orphans and vulnerable children (OVC) receive support. The centre helps these OVC’s with homework, provides one home cooked meal a day and donates food parcels to those that need them most.

On 30 August 2011 implementation of the garden at the Nontsikelelo centre began.  On the day, project representatives from  Wattville and surrounding areas were invited for training. The workshop was designed to convey the basics of Permaculture methodology, and has benefitted these community members and enabled them to apply their acquired skills at their respective projects.

Since implementation, produce is bursting out of the garden and it is clear that the Nontsikelelo project is doing very well. It is encouraging to see the 300 OVCs receive a nutritious plate of food with fresh vegetables from the garden. “It is such a blessing and so inspiring, and this is the greatest reward we receive for the work we do” said Busi Wawa, FTFA Project Officer.

Mr Godfrey  Radloff, a  long  time  supporter  of  FTFA, donated  R5  050  for  the Trees for Homes  programme  and  R5 050 for the EduPlant programme again  in 2011 which was allocated to Greenbury  Primary School in Durban.

This school  has  been  participating  in  the  EduPlant  cluster  workshops  and  the  KwaZulu Natal  facilitator, Bharathi Tugh, is very impressed with the progress made at this school in such a short time.

The Trees for Homes funding planted 56 trees in the community of Delft on 18 March 2011, in celebration of Water Week. International World Water Day is held annually on 22 March  to  focus  attention  on  the  importance  of  freshwater  and  advocate  sustainable  management  of freshwater  resources.  The  theme  was  -  Water  for  Cities  –  Responding  to  the  Urban  Water Challenge. The trees were distributed in conjunction with 112 trees that were sponsored by SRK Consulting.

At  the  event  the  importance  of  saving  and  harvesting  water  in  the  community  and  the  use  of  mulch around the trees to prevent evaporation, were highlighted. It is hoped that within a few years, Delft will be a flourishing, green community and that the awareness and importance of the wise use and conservation of water will be greatly heightened.

For the second year in a row in 2011 Just Trees in Paarl took steps to ensure that their trees carry no residual carbon footprint. The nursery conducted an internal assessment and then calculated their carbon footprint under the guidelines set out in the GHG Protocol. This was then reviewed by experienced carbon footprint analysts all regulated by The Carbon Protocol South Africa.

It was determined that Just Trees generated 477 tons of CO2e for the financial year ending 28 February 2011. By combining initial steps to reduce emissions (for example, by decreasing energy use, being water-wise and improving on transport efficiencies), with the donation of 1 274 trees through FTFAs award winning Trees for Homes initiative, Just Trees offset their remaining carbon footprint through the planting of these trees in the Western Cape. This subsequently rendered Just Trees carbon neutral.

Just Trees is a great supporter of FTFA through the provision of great quality trees at reasonable prices and donates many as well!

Healthy food not only can, but indeed does change lives! Only two and a half months after planting at the Galakwinstroom and Lesodi Primary schools, both in the Waterberg district in Limpopo, vegetables such as spinach and lettuce were ready for harvesting.

The school prepares meals for its 300 learners five days per week.  After harvesting from the new garden  the  learners  enjoyed fresh,  naturally grown  spinach which  is  one  of  the  top  ten  healthy vegetables. The vitamin A, C and calcium fight high blood pressure and heart disease. The  spinach  grown in the garden  is  especially good to eat as it is free of insecticides, herbicides and fungicides.

At Galakwinstroom the Principal and educators are devoted to the success of the garden, which would explain its lush and verdant appearance. The learners work in the garden during the holidays and community members support the activities during the year. The learners also now eat and enjoy lettuce, some tasting it for the first time. 

“Now that we are eating from our own land, we appreciate our efforts that resulted in this “said Seanego, the project coordinator.

The garden has been supplying food to the school feeding scheme weekly and  learners  enjoy  fresh  produce  that  is  combined  with  the  food  supplied through the government. The 21 orphaned and vulnerable children (OVCs) were receiving vegetables to take home every Friday at the time of FTFAs last evaluation, giving them healthy food to enjoy over the weekend.

Over time, eating this produce should go a long way to improving the overall diets of the learners which in turn will help them learn more efficiently and grow strong and healthy.

Pioneer Foods’ two permaculture food gardening projects at Mafolofolo High School and Ratanang Community are shining examples of how livelihoods can be transformed. 

The projects, implemented in 2009, have had a huge impact on project members, learners, educators, local schools and community members alike.

Aside from supplying good, organic nutritious veggies, opportunities for the disadvantaged communities of Sibayeng and Mankweng have also improved as they have learnt the skills to create and manage their own permaculture gardens.

The  Mafolofolo  High   School   staff, learners, educators   and   community members   are  extremely grateful to Pioneer  Foods,  through  FTFA,  for the  support  given  to  them.  They are running the project well and appear to be operating sustainably, generating an impressive income from the sale of produce to local supermarkets and spaza shops.

Ratanang Permaculture food garden project, although doing very well to achieve the laid out objectives, requires further support in order to cultivate the remaining three hectares of land available. The additional space  could  help  to  employ  more  community  members  and  increase  income  generation  for  the members.

FTFA appreciates the ongoing support that Pioneer Foods provides and looks forward to working together with Pioneer Foods in the future, helping to create more positive changes .

Working in Nyanga, one of the poorest and possibly most dangerous parts of Cape Town, it`s wonderful to see what a huge difference small changes make.

FTFA is grateful for the opportunity to work with Hlengisa Primary School and thanks Tullow Oil for their commitment towards enabling them to expand their current food garden, which assists the feeding scheme by supplying fresh organic vegetables. The funding also targeted specific areas of need, such as erecting a fence around the garden and teaching the project members about Permaculture gardening methods.

Without the fence there would have been no garden. Without the garden a valuable transfer of long term skills and education would not have arisen. Perhaps for some learners the symbiotic relationship between the natural world and humans would have remained a mystery.

The children of Hlengisa have now learned about the benefits of a food garden, a greener environment and recycling. They learned how to work as a team and how to care for creatures that help to care for us.

Although challenges were encountered during the implementation of this project, the food garden has had a positive impact on the school. It is hoped that the school will continue to participate in these greening activities and further develop the ones already started.

Tullow Oil funding has done far more than simply create a garden. It has allowed a doorway of opportunity to open.

Who knew that when the provincial ecopreneurs joined FTFA for the annual training workshops, that it would turn out to be far more stimulating than just a long week of paperwork?

Activities kicked off with a drumming workshop hosted by the fabulous Drum Café. We all pinged, banged and drummed and the singing nightingales in ethnic beading led us with hip shaking, hand clapping, finger snapping rythmn that was contagious and affected even the birds in the trees above.

The rest of the workshops offered ecopreneurs an opportunity to discuss the rollout and implementation process of each programme and make suggestions  which would streamline the administration processes.  Being on the ground, ecopreneurs have great insight into what potential issues can arise and the frank and open discourse was the ideal platform to iron out problems.Each programme, not to mention the programme managers, received a thorough going over.

The week included a site visit to the pilot bamboo project sponsored by Eqstra Flexi Logistics in Leandra and concluded on a high note with a medicinal herb workshop held by Ewald Viljoen. When a group of passionate and committed permaculturists gather, you can bet you are going to learn a lot about the secret life of plants.

To all participants, we thank you for sharing, laughing, uplifting and infusing our first week back at work with a tangible energy that left us inspired and rejuvenated.

Christmas is usually a time of giving and good cheer, but this Christmas, looking back on a year of global environmental upheaval, is it not time we gave differently? And this giving doesn’t necessarily relate to the size of our pockets, but the size of our concern.

Their flights might be cheap, but there’s nothing cheap about kulula’s Project Green programme. Introduced to combat carbon and greenhouse gas emissions produced by their aircraft, kulula has raised an amazing R1 000 000 of which R618 300 was used to plant 6 870 trees across South Africa in 2011. This initiative will support greening and mitigate climate change through Food & Trees for Africa (FTFA).

A shining example of a company that really walks or rather drives the green talk is Avis, another of FTFAs long time supporters.

BallStraathof has been a loyal supporter of Food & Trees for Africa (FTFA) for many years through the donation of packets of vegetable and flower seeds.

To raise awareness around climate change issues, 12 employees from the FirstRand Group today embarked on a gruelling cycle challenge from Johannesburg to the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Durban (COP17)

Barloworld South Africa was delighted to join forces with Food & Trees for Africa(FTFA) in helping to green under resourced primary schools in Gauteng. All together 11 primary schools across Katlehong, Vosloruus, Tembisa and Soweto were selected to take part with a total of 333 trees donated by Barloworld to FTFAs Trees for All programme.

At COP17 Food & Trees for Africa (FTFA) is excited to be teaming up with Airports Company South Africa (ACSA) to help visitors arriving in Durban to make their journey a carbon neutral one.

MTN will usher in the COP17 climate change conference by planting a total of 2 000 trees in the Nazareth RDP settlement in Pinetown, west of Durban.

In the lead up to COP17, the Conference of the Parties to discuss agreements around climate change to be held in Durban in a few weeks time, Food & Trees for Africa’s innovative Climatree offers all an opportunity to make their climate pledge.

The seventeenth Conference of the Parties (COP17) which kicked off in South Africa on 28 November 2011, will again shift global attention to climate change, while organisations such as the Climate Change Leadership Awards (CCLA) ensures meaningful progress is made in South African communities after the conference is concluded.

Absa’s Make a Difference (MAD) campaign will run until 5 November. The focus this year is simple but significant as the bank partners with schools countrywide to plant trees.

Amalgamated Beverage Industries (ABI), the soft drinks division of South African Breweries (SAB), will sponsor a new category in the Climate Change Leadership Awards (CCLA).

The global crisis in food prices has made substantial headlines, obviating the need for detailing its severity. Suffice to say global maize and wheat prices have soared by up to 80% in the last year, and the price of rice has doubled. One billion on the planet are already severely malnourished and food riots are increasing globally. Food insecurity is thus acknowledged, as is the fact that the poor are being hit hardest, particularly in Africa.

It’s World Food Day on 16 October and Woolworths is inviting South Africans to plant a virtual seedling to benefit schools’ food gardens.

On 17 October 2011, Shell South Africa celebrated World Food Day at AB Phokombe High School in Gauteng.

JOHANNESBURG - We have all heard about Kenya’s Nobel-Prize winning eco-warrior Wangari Maathai, who died two weeks ago, but did you know we have a similar environmental activist in Jo’burg?

World Food Day this year recognises the spiralling costs of food and the billion that are already hungry. The theme, “FOOD PRICES – FROM CRISIS TO STABILITY”, has been chosen to shed some light on this trend and what can be done to mitigate its impact on the most vulnerable. Price swings, upswings in particular, represent a major threat to food security in developing countries. Hardest-hit are the poor. According to the World Bank, in 2010-2011 rising food costs pushed nearly 70 million people into extreme poverty (www.fao.org).

In 2010 Comhousing took the initiative to add value to the low cost housing units that they had built in certain Kwazulu-Natal Municipalities, through the planting of 7 300 fruit and indigenous trees. These trees were distributed through Food & Trees for Africa’s Trees for Homes programme.

The youth of South Africa are invited to make their pledge to reduce the impacts of climate change in the lead up to the 17th Conference of the Parties (COP17) that South Africa will host at the end of November. This is a time when world leaders will meet again to try to reach a fair and binding agreement on carbon reductions. Carbon is the common term used for the greenhouse gases that are causing the trapping of excess heat that is impacting so dramatically on our climate, already wreaking increasing havoc across the planet and that will so severely limit the quality of life of us all into the future.

Eqstra Flexi Logistics (Flexi Logistics) is a dynamic company within the mobility solutions industry. Flexi Logistics is a division of Eqstra Holdings Limited, an integrated leasing and capital equipment group. The core activities of the group are focused on the contract mining, industrial and mining equipment distributorships, passenger and commercial vehicle leasing and logistics services in the commodity sector.

One would think that a nursery – by virtue of the fact that its business is trees – is ‘green’ by default. But take into account factors such as the electricity, fuel, fertilizer, containers, plastic bags, paper and transport that are required to produce trees and, like any other product, a container-grown tree can tread heavily on the Earth in terms of the carbon footprint it leaves behind.

kulula’s Project Green programme, to combat the carbon and greenhouse gas emissions released by their aircraft, has already planted 6 870 trees this year to support greening and mitigate climate change through Food & Trees for Africa (FTFA). Now they are supporting the launch of Green Day, 30 September when they will plant another 500 fruit and indigenous trees to residents in the dusty township of Parkgate, in Durban.

The Pioneer Foods Group and Food & Trees for Africa (FTFA) have united to support the development of the Ratanang and Mafolofolo permaculture food gardens and environmental greening projects in the Limpopo province.

On the 24th of September, as part of the Moving Planet initiatives around the world, Indigo Skate Camp set out to plant 111 orange trees in and around the Zulu village of Isithumba in the Valley of 1 000 Hills, Durban

From the 6-9 th October, owners of BMW GS bikes across South Africa will join together to experience the annual celebration of their unique off-road/road motorcycles.

2011 sees the third annual celebration of Arbor Month in South Africa take place in September. Originally Arbor Day, tree awareness and interest has grown tremendously in South Africa that it has progressed from National Arbor Week in 1997 to Arbor Month in 2009.

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Elsbury Primary School in the Western Cape held a tree planting event in celebration of Arbor 2011 thanks to Willard Batteries. On 13 September Willard Batteries staff joined the school to celebrate the planting of 20 trees.

The Discovery Invest Leadership Summit took place in Sandton, Johannesburg on Wednesday 21 September 2011. Former US Vice President and prominent social activist for climate change, Al Gore, was the Keynote Speaker at the event. During Gore’s passionate address, which centered around sustainable investment, special mention was given to Jeunesse Park, a Non-Executive Director of environmental consultancy Global Carbon Exchange (GCX) and founder of the environmental enterprise, Food & Trees for Africa (FTFA) and the Climate Change Leadership Awards and Carbon Protocol.

Rustenburg Municipality celebrated the donation of 50 indigenous trees to Boikagong School with learners and educators at a tree planting ceremony at the school.

Vesuvius is a community of experts. Present around the world, we deliver solutions to our customers to improve their efficiency.  The services we offer encompass the development, manufacture and supply of refractory products. Vesuvius is a world leader in refractory products.

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Food & Trees for Africa and Global Carbon Exchange (GCX), a leading strategic sustainability consultancy and training provider, have announced the launch of ‘Green Day, on 30 September 2011. Green Day has been initiated to take environmental awareness issues more mainstream.

Bidvest company, Konica Minolta South Africa, has been working with South Africa’s national greening and food gardening social enterprise, FTFA, since 2008 to plant trees to offset some of their carbon emissions and improve environments.

"Extreme weather events are becoming the new normal," said Jeunesse Park in her delivery of the 24 Hours of Reality presentation. South Africans joined millions of others last night in watching the live streaming of SAs representative speaking on climate change, as part of the global Climate Reality Project .

kulula’s Project Green programme, which aims to combat the atmospheric carbon loads and greenhouses gases released by its aircraft, has raised R1 million to support greening and mitigate climate change through FTFA.

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On 24 September, Food & Trees for Africa joined people across the globe in Moving Planet: a day to move beyond fossil fuels.

During Arbour Week 2011 IMPERIAL Logistics, together with member companies Express Hauliers, IMPERIAL Distribution, 777 Logistics, Paltrack and Pragma planted 210 trees across Johannesburg, Durban and Cape Town. Trees were planted at Tembisa’s Maphutha Secondary School and Moriting Primary School, Ekujabuleni Primary School in Pinetown and Berzelia Primary School in Cape Town.

Nellmapius received 2 180 trees from Audi SA in September as part of Arbor Month celebrations. Arbor Month aims to motivate individuals, schools, businesses and communities to plant, sponsor and look after our diverse natural tree heritage. These 2 180 trees form part of over 8 000 trees that Audi South Africa committed to planting around South Africa, through the  FTFAs Trees for Homes programme this year.

The recycle, reuse and reduce competition at Mthombeni Primary School in Mhluzi, Middelburg has reached boiling point. On Friday September the 2nd, winners were awarded with prizes from Coca-Cola.

Celebrating the start of Arbor Month, Nashua Mobile and Food & Trees for Africa (FTFA), will be planting 490 trees in Molote Village, Magaliesburg on Thursday, 1 September at the Molote Community Hall at 10h00.

Audi South Africa’s Tree Planting Initiative, in conjunction with Food & Trees for Africa, continues to gather momentum with a further 8 735 plantings planned for 2011 across South Africa.

In an international first, Food & Trees for Africa’s Bamboo for Africa has been registered as a Verified Emissions Reduction programme under the international Verified Carbon Standard. This brings cost effective carbon sequestration to South Africa and addresses enterprise development, corporate social investment and black economic empowerment.

Since 2009, Postwink Recycling Products (a nationwide supplier of recycling bins) has been including a small contribution to Food & Trees for Africa (FTFA) in all their pricing.

Absa, together with Food & Trees for Africa (FTFA), celebrated the launch of their new Absa Green Vehicle Finance product, by donating 150 trees to the grateful community of Glen Ridge, Soweto on 24 August 2011. The tree distribution followed the product launch at the Absa West Towers in Johannesburg.

FTFAs new Growing Green book is an easy to use guide on everything you need to know about tree planting and maintenance, permaculture and starting your own nursery. We have combined our previous booklets, re-edited, updated and produced  this practical text book with space for notes. Click here to buy your copy now

Barren settlements in Durban and Port Elizabeth are the lucky recipients of 3 000 trees from Trudon in September, Arbor Month, which aims to motivate individuals, schools, businesses and communities to plant, sponsor and look after our wonderful and diverse natural tree heritage. These 3 000 trees are the last of 10 000 trees that Trudon (publishers of the Yellow Pages) committed to planting around South Africa through Food & Trees for Africa’s (FTFA) Trees for Homes programme in 2011, The International Year of Forests.

In 2009 Browns the Diamond Store launched their Plum Tree Project, a project aimed at providing fruit bearing trees to low-income communities. “Every time one of our clients purchases an item of jewellery from our Private Collection we will purchase and plant a tree on their behalf,” explained Larry Brown, Designer and Director of Browns the Diamond Store.

Residents of Doornkop in the Steve Tswete Municipality were enthusiastic about the 176 trees they planted this week thanks to “Tractors for Trees”, a joint initiative between vehicle and asset finance specialist WesBank, Afgri and Food & Trees for Africa (FTFA).

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In a drive to convert its customers to electronic billing, Nashua Mobile, in September 2008, committed to donate R10 to Food & Trees for Africa (FTFA) for every customer that opted to receive electronic rather than paper bills.

Jeunesse Park to present in Durban as part of 24 Hours of Reality, a worldwide event to connect the dots between extreme weather and our changing climate

Food & Trees for Africa exhibited their Bamboo for Africa programme at South Africa's first ever Bamboo Symposium. Agronomy and inventive community planting programs, home and office products, as well as energy products and equipment, to show the full value cycle of this versatile plant were presented.

The Climate Change Leadership Awards (CCLA)  opened for entries August 1, 2011. This is the third year of the competition and the CCLA is hoping to reach out to an even greater number of people and companies to widen the circle of climate change responsibility. Individuals, schools, local municipalities and companies are encouraged to enter on www.ccla.co.za.

On Friday morning, 29th July, the learners at the Hillcrest Primary School in Kensington spent the morning working with employees from FirstRand to implement a permaculture food garden.  This team of FirstRand volunteers and learners from the school were working under the guidance and expertise of a team from Food & Trees for Africa.

“Pioneer Foods supports projects that specifically target those interventions that appropriately improve the ability of the previously disadvantaged individuals to feed and nourish themselves and their families,” states Pioneer Foods’ Website, July 2011.

Khayelitsha Special School has a dedicated group of children enthusiastically involved in their food garden. It is serving well as an outside classroom and also producing healthy vegetables that are used to feed the learners.

Empire Toy & Stationery contacted Food & Trees for Africa (FTFA) in January 2009 as they wished to donate a percentage of sales from their Butterfly board and paper products.

As a reward for the hard work and dedication of 12 students of the Audi Makgetse food garden project, a five day training retreat was arranged at Tlholego eco village in the North West. The training was facilitated by Permaculture guru Ms Susie Spies, Nikki Robins from Tlholego and Mikal Lambert from Food & Trees for Africa (FTFA).

Thanks to the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands the verdant food gardening project at Lugedlane Primary School in Mpumalanga Province is producing not only vegetables, but a new generation of enthusiastic and knowledgeable young gardeners.

Thanks to the Shell Retail Challenge, members of Basadi Temong, a community based organisation in Phutaditjaba, Free State, are hard at work preparing  land for a food garden.

FTFA Facilitator, Mikal Brown, has just returned from an eye opening trip to Nakuru, Kenya where he attended the Slow Food workshop coordinated by Slow Food.

Nashua Mobile has presented a cheque of R383,480 to Food & Trees for Africa (FTFA), bringing the total donations it has made to the environmental organisation over the past three years to more than R1million.

Mandela Day is an annual celebration of Nelson Mandela’s life and a global call to action for people to recognise their individual power to make an imprint and change the world around them.

In commemorating World Environment Day in the month of June, General Motors South Africa (GMSA) in conjunction with Food & Trees for Africa donated 30 trees to Settlers Park Primary School in Walmer, Port Elizabeth, during their annual Green Week programme.

kulula fans raised an amazing R1 million to support Food & Trees for Africa (FTFA) efforts to respond to climate change and improve environments, especially for the poor. This was achieved through kulula’s Project Green Programme, which aims to combat the atmospheric carbon loads and greenhouse gases released by their aircraft.

To celebrate Youth Day the National Lottery Distribution Trust Fund (NLDTF)  planted 1 800 fruit and indigenous trees for Mpumelelo, France, a settlement on the eastern outskirts of the deforested and semi rural landscape of Pietermaritzburg.

Since May 2010, Makgetse High School, in Hammanskraal, has been busily developing a Permaculture food garden with the help of Audi SA and Food & Trees for Africa (FTFA).

During the month of June, Trudon (Publishers of the Yellow Pages) distributed 1 500 trees to the fortunate residents of Braamfisherville, Gauteng, as part of an ongoing effort to green townships.

On the 28th and 29th of May, McCarthy rally drivers and FirstRand’s very enthusiastic team of volunteers arrived in the North West province in a convoy of 25 vehicles and 100 employees, after a long 3 hour drive through to Wolmaranstad. They were on a mission to deliver teacher reading material to 12 under resourced schools in the region.

In celebration of World Environment 5 June 2011, Food & Trees for Africa have distributed another 3 662 Trees for Homes in Mdantsane Eastern Cape thanks to the National Lottery Distribution Trust Fund (NLDTF). In keeping with this year’s theme, “Forests, nature at your service”, these trees are part of the 45 000 the NLDTF has provided for under-served and disadvantaged communities across the country. This contribution reflects their ongoing commitment to social upliftment and poverty alleviation in South Africa.

With the support of ConVista Consulting, learners at the Khayelitsha Special School have had the opportunity to learn permaculture food gardening skills for the last year and a half.  They are now proud to announce the launch of their garden which signifies the culmination of these teachings.

Cadosi Corporate Consulting is professional outsourced procurement and print optimization company that has performed analysis on a variety of major corporations and identified key areas of savings for anyone using printers, copy machines or telecoms devices. Many companies are now saving hundreds of thousands of rands monthly.

With the link between deforestation and food security increasingly apparent, EduPlant is delighted that the theme of this year’s World Environment Day on 5th June is “Forests – Nature at your Service.”

The road to Makapanstad is long and dusty and peppered with small communities eking out a living in the flat expanse of bushveld. Prieska, One Ten... the names flash past along with the cattle and donkeys.

Alwin Kgopa is a force of nature. With her infectious laugh, “can do” attitude and determination to empower and uplift the communities surrounding her home in Mankweng, Limpopo, she is also a force to be reckoned with.

With that as a rallying call, MTN’s 21 Days of Y’ello Care initiative kicks off across the mobile operator’s vast footprint in Africa and the Middle East today. This has seen thousands of MTN staff volunteers taking part in various tree-planting initiatives for 21 days.

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Africa 2.0 is an advocacy group of young Africans from across the continent who have a collective vision for Africa and are committed to finding sustainable solutions to some of the most pressing economic and social issues facing Africans today.

Some members of FTFA staff for whom Zulu is not a first language are taking the plunge and learning Zulu through Rosebank Language Centre's introduction to Zulu Class. This is a great step towards inter cultural integration- ngiyabonga utisha.

Coca Cola Shanduka Beverages (CCSB) continues with its “Live for a Difference” initiative.  The Campaign “Live for a difference” is CCSB’s commitment to make a positive difference in the communities it serves by redesigning the way the company works and lives so that sustainability is part of everything it does. 

The International Year of Forests, 2011, saw Food & Trees for Africa (FTFA) enter the final year of a three year agreement with the Raith Foundation. This project started in 2009 with the aim to distribute 14 136 Trees for Homes to community members in Burgersfort in Limpopo, Vosloorus in Gauteng and Kanana in the North West. With all but 2 556 trees already in the ground, the face of these communities has already been radically changed thanks to this wonderful programme.

We all know charities are going digital. But not all digital campaigns are created equal. Enter the seasoned team from Food & Trees for Africa (FTFA) with something really fresh – a mobisite that not only asks for donations, but in true “pay-it-forward” fashion, gives a lot to its donor community.

Audi South Africa’s Tree Planting Initiative in conjunction with Food & Trees for Africa, continues to gather momentum with a further 9 005 plantings planned for 2011.

A recent public outcry in Sandton prompted the importer to support an initiative to replace uprooted trees on Sandton Drive.

The National Lottery Distribution Trust Fund (NLDTF)is supporting 45 000 Trees for Homes for 45 000 residents of low cost settlements across South Africa in 2011, The International Year of Forests. This contribution to Food & Trees for Africa (FTFA)has also given 900 residents of the beneficiary communities an opportunity to receive training and some payment as community educators who are becoming climate change and greening leaders.

Coca Cola Shanduka Beverages (CCSB) continues with its “Live for a Difference” initiative.  The Campaign “Live for a difference” is CCSB’s commitment to make a positive difference in the communities it serves by redesigning the way the company works and lives so that sustainability is part of everything it does. 

As South Africa gears up to host the 17th United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP 17) in Durban at the end of November 2011, kulula.com and national greening enterprise Food & Trees for Africa (FTFA) are working harder than ever to green areas in and around Durban.

Soweto residents from Braamfischerville Extension 13 received 444 trees, thanks to a joint initiative between vehicle and asset finance specialist WesBank, and Food & Trees for Africa (FTFA).

Braamfisherville was built in 2005 when Alexandra residents were moved there after the blasting of the Juskei River caused flooding and damaged many homes. The township has grown and now encompasses almost 2 500 low cost houses, for a mostly unemployed community.

Make The Heaven, an organisation spreading peace, hope and planting trees have for the last two years, brought eco volunteers to South Africa. These gentle people have sponsored and planted thousands of trees, and implemented food gardens in the poorest areas.