The ORCA Foundation – Planet Green Ocean Blue: Carbon Neutral Travel

Planet Green Ocean Blue is one of the initiatives of the ORCA Foundation – a non-profit organisation set up in 2001 based in Plettenberg Bay on the world famous Garden Route in South Africa. Planet Green Ocean Blue’s work embraces best practices in sustainable environmental activities that use local labour while also playing an important role restoring indigenous forest and reducing the carbon emissions that are threatening our planet. They are restoring denuded areas in the Garden Route, South Africa by planting in areas where conditions are ideal for an indigenous forest to be restored to its former status. They have carefully monitored agreements with land owners to ensure the trees will be kept safe once planted, and with the aid of nurseries and experts they select that the best suitable trees are planted to ensure their survival.

Terra Nova is proud to announce that every year we calculate our annual carbon offset, and have planted trees to neutralise this accordingly, making us the first official carbon neutral tour operator in South Africa. We have been given the GPS coordinates of our ‘trees’ and can watch them grow on Google Earth. We did however also send our intern, Thomas Lucet, to volunteer with the ORCA Foundation in 2008, where he helped plant some of the trees personally, over and above assisting the foundation in their vital coastal and marine research and participating in community work within the surrounding townships.