This year’s tree planting initiative on Friday 25th March saw Cube, a Group company, carry out the planting honours. The planting team of 13 headed up by Trevor Hall, Cube’s Managing Director, managed to plant 290 trees between them.
The trees planted, including Oak, Ash, Rowan and Birch, were the actual trees used to offset the Group’s emissions in 2009/10. These broadleaf species will help restore a natural woodland after a nearby commercial pine forest is felled next year.
The Fourfront Group is Carbon Negative through its offsetting with Moor Trees. Its carbon footprint for 2009/10 was 187.5 tonnes, which was a 4.75% decrease on the previous year. This initiative adds to the Group’s wider socio-environmental initiatives i.e. minimising its environmental impacts and developing social programmes, this includes ISO 14001 accreditation and charity support.
Clive Lucking, the Fourfront Group’s Managing Director, said "Our offsetting partnership with Moor Trees is one we are very proud of. We don’t believe in simply paying to cover our carbon emissions, we like to get involved, and planting the trees ourselves is a great team-building event and everyone leaves feeling we have really made a positive impact to the environment. I think it important to add we don’t see offsetting as the answer though, we believe carbon reduction is key and we make every effort to monitor and reduce the Group's carbon emissions. Our ongoing commitment is to reduce our carbon footprint per capita by a minimum of 5% a year."
Brain Daniel, Moor Trees, who led the day, said "We are always grateful for the Fourfront Group’s on-going commitment and support. The day was very productive and the team worked extremely hard, at one point the team was digging holes so quickly we didn’t have enough trees to fill them! We are delighted with the results and look forward to welcoming them back next year on their next planting day to see the difference that they have made."
