Words by Smiley Team
To mark World Environment Day on 5th June, cards manufacturer UK Greetings (UKG) launched a new collaboration with the World Land Trust to offset nearly 10,000 tonnes of CO2 emissions, one of the largest commitments made as part of the trust’s Carbon Balanced Paper programme.
Chris Shaw, Head of Sustainability at UK Greetings, said: “Since 2019, we have removed over 250 tonnes of single use plastic from our cards and reduced our carbon footprint by 400 tonnes simply by improving our energy efficiency.
“With paper being our primary raw material, we work closely with our suppliers to help ensure that every single card and paper product can be physically traced back to sustainably managed forests.
“Choosing Carbon Balanced Paper was therefore a natural next step in our sustainability journey. We are thrilled to support the World Land Trust in their efforts to protect the world’s most biologically significant and threatened habitats.”
Carbon Balancing allows companies that use carbon-emitting materials to invest in projects that preserve forests as a vital means to absorb CO2 back from the atmosphere.
By switching to Carbon Balanced Paper, the company will finance the protection of 635 acres of threatened habitats in the Khe Nuoc Trong region of Vietnam. The World Land Trust’s Carbon Balanced project in this area covers 52,000 acres across the Annamite Mountain Range of North-Central Vietnam.
The tropical forest here offers one of the few remaining havens for biodiversity in a land heavily damaged by deforestation. It offers food and shelter to Critically Endangered species such as the Sunda Pangolin, the Red-shanked Douc Langur, and one of the rarest large mammals on the planet: the Saola, otherwise known as the “Asian unicorn”.
The World Land Trust is a conservation charity that works globally to protect biologically important habitats. Supported by David Attenborough, they operate via a network of partner organisations who work with local communities to create reserves of land, replenishing and preserving nature.
Director of communications and development at the World Land Trust, Dan Bradbury, said: “WLT works with a network of local partners around the world – currently in 20 countries - to save, protect and restore critically threatened habitat for wildlife, and in doing so, lock up carbon and address climate change.
“WLT has been saving land to save species for more than 30 years, and today our work to protect existing tropical forest habitat is more urgent than ever to save what remains of these vital ecosystems for wildlife. We couldn’t do any of it without the help of our amazing supporters, and we thank UK Greetings for their commitment.”
To support their work, donate here.
Find more information at worldlandtrust.org.
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