Greening Communities

In 2007, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released its Fourth Assessment Report, which stated:

“Global GHG [green house gas] emissions due to human activities have grown since pre-industrial times, with an increase of 70% between 1970 and 2004.” and

“Most of the observed increase in global average temperatures since the mid-20th century is very likely due to the observed increase in anthropogenic GHG [green house gas] concentrations.”

Trees have been recognised as one of nature’s key land based means to absorb, store, and process atmospheric carbon dioxide, which has been identified as one of the main green house contributing to climate change.

Against this backdrop and reflecting our guiding ecological philosophy, Banyan Tree increased its commitment to tackle the issues of climate change by launching Greening Communities in 2007. Banyan Tree’s group wide environmental initiative targeting climate change, Greening Communities challenges our resorts to plant 2,000 new trees per year for the next 10 years. While the initiative will offset a small amount of the globally produced atmospheric carbon dioxide, the main goal is to drive greater awareness of climate change among our communities, associates, and guests.

We started with 7 initial locations in Thailand (Phuket and Bangkok), Indonesia (Bintan), Maldives, Seychelles, China (Lijiang), and Australia (Cairns) in 2007 and will continue ramping up in the coming years. Resorts were tasked to plant non invasive species on protected locations such as schools or parks where any newly planted trees have a significantly high likelihood of long term longevity.

When carrying out the plantings, our teams engaged community members, guests, and associates in order raise awareness of the issues and potential consequences of climate change. Such more widespread involvement sought to capitalise on the multiplier effect to drive understanding and actions to help reduce the globally collective negative impacts upon our environment. Later in the year two more locations joined to take part Laos (Luang Prabang) and Singapore. While not all participating locations were able to achieve their 2000 tree goal in this first year of the initiative, such locations have committed to make up for any shortfalls with future planting.

 


     Greening Communities 2009

     2009, our third year of Greenings Communities  ... more info