The Queen’s jubilee tree planting scheme is sponsored by deforestation companies, activists say.
Across the country, people have been asked to “plant a jubilee tree” in honor of the Queen’s throne in the 1970s.
The Queen’s Green Canopy scheme will dedicate a network of 70 ancient forests in the UK and identify 70 ancient trees to “celebrate Her Majesty’s 70th anniversary”.
This move is aimed at reforestation in the United Kingdom. However, the campaign team expressed concerns about some of the “platinum” sponsors of the scheme, which are listed on the official website. These include McDonald’s, which is linked to deforestation in Brazil.
Another platinum sponsor is Coutts, the Queen’s Bank. As part of the NatWest group, Coutts invests in various companies that participants in the Wild Card NGO’s campaign accuse of benefiting from deforestation.
These include the energy company Drax, which uses biomass for fuel. In 2021, the Drax power plant in Yorkshire burned 8.3 million tonnes of pellets made from around 16.6 million tonnes of freshly cut (“green”) wood, but there are growing concerns about the sustainability of this practice.
NatWest is also investing in the UPM pulp mill, which is accused of causing deforestation in Uruguay by collecting paper trees. The energy company Vattenfall, which sells wood pellets and wood chips to energy companies, is also funded by the group.
Activists have accused the royal family of helping large corporations green their environmental records.
Louise Casson, Forest Manager at Greenpeace UK, said: “Unfortunately, the number of trees that this scheme can help plant is a small fraction of the number that the scheme’s corporate sponsors have helped to destroy. It is an insult to the volunteers involved to use their efforts to green the reputation of companies involved in deforestation around the world.
Joel Scott-Halks, co-founder of Wild Card, added: “The royal family is helping large corporations plant their own planet-destroying activities. As representatives of our nation, they involve us all in shamefully disguising the appalling environmental reputations of these global companies.
“As the largest family of landowners in Britain, royalty should use their time to turn over and afforest their own huge estates – not give their name to companies like McDonald’s.
Wild Card also criticized Rentokil’s platinum sponsorship scheme when the company advertised its winged insect killing services, which have fallen by 60 percent since 2004.
Emma Smart, campaign coordinator for the NGO, said: “A company that benefits from the destruction of bees, ants, moths, wasps and flies, which are essential for the survival of tree canopies, vital not only to nature but also to people, it’s not just greenery. , it is ecological ”.
Rentokil said: “The type of work we do is to help customers control flies in food production or preparation rooms, bed bugs in hotels, cockroaches in kitchens. We also work in parts of the world where mosquitoes cause malaria and zika [virus]with the associated serious impact on human health. “
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During her reign, the Queen planted more than 1,500 trees around the world, and her subjects were asked to plant millions in the United Kingdom as a “special gift” for the anniversary celebrations.
However, her own land is relatively devoid of trees. The royal family owns more than 850,000 acres (350,000 hectares) of land and coastline, but many of their properties have less wood cover than other parts of the United Kingdom. For example, the Duchy of Cornwall, owned by Prince Charles, has only 6% tree cover compared to 16% in the United Kingdom.
Balmoral, the Queen’s estate in Scotland, would naturally be a temperate rainforest, but environmentalists say there are large areas of reed swamps and only small fragments of forest.
The Crown mansion manages a £ 14.1 billion property portfolio that includes Windsor Great Park and urban areas such as Regent Street in central London, as well as 264,000 acres of farmland, forests and hills. An independent trading business, he passed on all his profits to the Ministry of Finance, which transferred 25% of the profits – with a two-year delay – to the Queen through the sovereign grant.
Earlier, campaign participants asked the crown to commit to making space for nature – and potentially for the forest – even if it would affect profits.
A spokesman said: “The Queen’s Green Canopy is very grateful to our platinum supporters who have helped enable the planting of over a million trees in the UK since October 2021. Every company that has generously supported the QGC is committed to rigorous and challenging aims at both deforestation and biodiversity.
“As a charitable initiative that has not received funding from taxpayers, we depend on donors to achieve our goals, namely to fund the planting of trees in the most deprived areas in the UK.
“Through this support, we will continue to plant a significant number of trees in the fall until the end of the platinum anniversary year. The legacy of this campaign will make a difference for future generations and will encourage the planting of trees for a long time to come. “
A McDonald’s spokesman told the Guardian: “McDonald’s is committed to eliminating deforestation from its global supply chains by 2030.
In 2020, we reached an important stage by achieving our goal of maintaining supply chains without deforestation for several of our main ingredients and materials – beef, chicken (soy in feed), palm oil, coffee and fiber used in packaging. customers.
“We admit that we still have work to do. That is why we are accelerating progress in this area, and as a signatory to the UK Soybean Manifesto, we are committed to supplying soybeans used as both an ingredient and in animal feed in our supply chains, from supply chains without deforestation to the end. from 2025. ”
Natwest said it has identified biodiversity and nature loss as an emerging risk to the bank and is a member of the forum of the working group on financial disclosures related to nature.
“Our private bank Coutts is proud to support tree planting in schools and poor urban areas through the Queen’s Green Canopy as part of its broader commitment to inspire tree planting in the UK and support young people to develop green skills and find a job.
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