Our southwest grounds’ maintenance team at VIVO Defence and MOD colleagues have won an award for planting hundreds of trees at RAF St Mawgan.
We at VIVO look after maintenance on military bases across southwest and central England and our team was praised by RAF commanders for the part it has played with others at the Cornish air station on various sustainability initiatives.
This included our Southwest Grounds Maintenance Manager Andrew Tregunna and our Arboricultural Specialist Gavin Aplin developing a proposal to plant over 300 mixed fruit trees at the base near Newquay.
Once this was approved by the Station Commander at RAF ST Mawgan, the base’s Health, Safety and Environmental Adviser Sarah Kretowicz set about organising a station-wide community event to carry out the planting in four different locations.
To aid this, our VIVO team helped in the planning and securing of funds for the event before its grounds’ maintenance team pre-dug holes for the trees using a mini digger.
After this, volunteers from military families near the base and other armed forces personnel worked alongside the VIVO team to get all the trees planted during the event.
A further 200 mixed broad leaf trees were then planted as a shelter belt to protect one of the newly created orchards from the strong Atlantic winds.
Now, at a special ceremony held on 11 July, RAF commanders awarded a Special Air Environmental Award to the base’s Sarah Kretowicz and VIVO’s Andrew Tregunna for their hard work bringing about the tree planting initiative.
The two were given their awards in Commemoration of Her Majesty the Queen's Platinum Jubilee through Project Delivery of The Queen's Green Canopy initiative.
Wg Cdr Helen Simpson, the Station Commander, said: “I am very proud of the Station being recognised for its work in delivering the QGC planting honouring Her late Majesty’s reign and creating a living memorial.
"Much hard work was put into achieving this and to have our personnel and industry partners recognised by Air with a Special Air Environmental Award is incredible.
“The Platinum Orchard, as the planted areas are collectively known, will grow and produce fruit, giving our Wholeforce personnel and their families, who joined in with the planting initiative, a place to enjoy nature and the produce for many years to come.”
Andrew Tregunna, our Grounds’ Maintenance Manager, added: “I am really proud and pleased to have won this award alongside our MOD colleagues. My team are committed to championing and improving sustainability as part of our work looking after greenspaces on military bases, so this means a lot to us.”
Our Operations Director for the southwest Built Estate, Amanda Hill, said: “Well done to Andrew, Sarah and everyone who worked together as such a great team. We at VIVO want to make sure that sustainability is front and centre of everything we do, and I am pleased that we worked so closely with the base and military families to bring about this great tree planting initiative.”