In celebration of Arbor Month this September, the City of Cape Town
will plant more than 500 trees across the metropole.
The trees will be planted during a number of events, and residents are encouraged to work together, take ownership of the trees being planted and uphold this year’s Arbor Month theme ‘Our Forest – Our Future’.
“Arbor Month is a chance to give our natural environment first priority and live out the famous Greek Proverb: ‘A society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they know they shall never sit in’,” says the City’s Mayoral Committee Member for Community Services and Special Projects, Alderman Belinda Walker.
Each year, Arbor Month celebrations highlight two tree species, one common and one rare. This year, the common tree is the Blossom Tree (Virgilia oroboides) and the rare trees are
the Cross-Berry (Grewia occidentalis) and Powder-puff trees (Barringtonia racemosa).
Alderman Walker will host an Arbor Month celebration at Macassar Square on Thursday,
5 September 2013. Close to R1 million was spent on upgrading the Macassar Square Park to create a quality environment where members of the community and their families can relax and spend quality time together.
“As a city, we need to look to how we can contribute to our future environmental sustainability. I hope that this Arbor Month will be an opportunity for all of us to work on improving Cape Town’s green landscape,” says Alderman Walker.
The City also aims to assist Environment Online (ENO) in reaching its goal of planting
100 million trees across the world by 2017. ENO is a global virtual school and network programme where thousands of schools around the world study their local environmental
issues and share the results on the internet. Planting trees is an essential activity in the ENO programme and the City forms part of the ENO Green Cities Network. This year, ENO activities will take place at various schools across the metro.
City Parks is in the process of implementing its Greening Strategy, which will serve as a guide for the next five to 10 years to improve and enhance the value of green spaces and the environment in a qualitative and sustainable manner.
As part of the City’s Greening Strategy, City Parks has planted 5 085 trees over the past year and plans to plant an additional 8 703 over the next two years.
