The Vice-President and Minister for the Environment of the Island Council of Tenerife, José Antonio Valbuena, and the Corporate Director for Sustainability, Innovation and Institutional Coordination of Red Eléctrica de España, Ana Cuevas, today signed a collaboration agreement for the reforestation of several areas of public forest belonging to the La Corona Forestal Natural Park, in the municipal area of Arico (Tenerife).
The agreement responds to the interest of both entities in collaborating in order to facilitate the protection and restoration of ecosystems through reforestation and restoration of habitats projects aimed at the biodiversity conservation.
This collaboration agreement, encompassed within The Red Eléctrica Forest project, will give way to a reforestation project that will plant Canary pine in 26.97 hectares of an area known as Chajaña.
The reforestation of this area is also part of the restoration project that, since 2006, is being carried out by Tenerife’s Island Council in the municipalities of Arico and Fasnia to recover the island's plant heritage in areas subject to intense agricultural and livestock activity in the past and which exist a risk of erosion.
Red Eléctrica will contribute 80,000 euros to the reforestation project; a project which also involves conducting awareness-raising activities that promote culture, volunteering and environmental education. For its part, Tenerife’s Island Council will undertake the technical management and supervision of the work, as well as the subsequent monitoring of the evolution of the vegetation cover.
The Red Eléctrica Forest is an environmental project of national scope which has been undertaken by the Company since 2009 with the aim of collaborating on the conservation of natural areas rich in biodiversity and the recovery of degraded areas, as well as contributing to the fight against climate change, therefore allowing part of their greenhouse gas emissions to be offset.
This reforestation initiative has given way to projects that have allowed a total of eleven Red Eléctrica forests to be created in Badajoz, Teruel, Cádiz, Murcia, Valencia, Vizcaya, Albacete, Majorca, two forests in Zamora and in La Coruña. These projects have led to the recovery of 761 hectares nationwide, and involved the planting of 638,145 trees and shrubs of different native species that will help offset 183,483 tonnes of CO2 throughout their life cycle. In addition, a new reforestation project will be undertaken shortly on the Firgas mountain located in Gran Canaria.
This initiative responds to the commitment undertaken by Red Eléctrica to collaborate with autonomous, island and local administrations on the sustainable economic and social development in the communities where the Company’s facilities are located.
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