Three pubs in the county have been helping to turn one million cups of coffee into a million trees.

Peter Borg-Neal, founder and chairman of Oakman Group, who own three pubs in Oxfordshire – Blue Boar, Witney, Crown and Thistle, Abingdon and Old Post Office, Wallingford – planted an Oak Tree in the company’s recently opened 1.2-acre Oakman Kitchen Garden at The Akerman Inn near Bicester last week.

Also present for the planting were team supervisor Marisa Blackman and Oakman’s Gardens and Sustainability Manager, Philip Jones.

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The occasion marked a celebration of the company’s achievement of planting over one million trees.

The first 1,400 of those trees, one for every Oakman employee, were planted in September 2021, marking the start of their mission to plant a million trees a year.

Since then, through a collaboration with Tree-nation, every cup of coffee sold across the group’s pubs and hotels has resulted in planting a tree, which the company claims helps offset some of the daily carbon emission produced by the business and its stakeholders.

Tree-nation is a not-for-profit organisation that helps support local communities, create jobs, and protect biodiversity through reforestation and conservation projects worldwide.

Oakman’s cup of coffee campaign helps their tree-planting projects in Madagascar and Tanzania flourish.

80 per cent of the trees are in Madagascar’s Eden project, with the other 20 per cent planted in Tanzania in the Usambara Biodiversity Conservation project.

Mr Borg-Neal said: “Planting this young Oak, which might live for 1,000 years, is a simple commemoration of what small groups can do with little effort or personal impact, but which can have profound effects.

“For example, we were the first pub group to ban plastic straws, eventually leading to their national disappearance.

“We were the first pub group to install electric charging points in our new pub car parks.

“We always seek ways to make a difference without losing sight of our commercial responsibilities.

“We couldn’t have achieved our first year’s target without the support of our guests.

“To say thank you, on Friday morning before planting the oak tree, all customers ordering a cup of coffee at any of our 40 pubs were given them on the house.”

Maxime Renaudin, the founder and CEO of Tree-nation, said: “A year ago, our sponsor, Oakman Group, committed to planting one tree with us for each coffee sold.

“One year later, they’ve reached the incredible milestone of one million trees.

“Congratulations to everyone at Oakman as well as all their customers who are changing the world. One coffee at a time.”

 

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This story was written by Matthew Norman, he joined the team in 2022 as a Facebook community reporter.

Matthew covers Bicester and focuses on finding stories from diverse communities.

Get in touch with him by emailing: Matthew.norman@newsquest.co.uk

Follow him on Twitter: @OxMailMattN1

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