The Tree Council of Ireland, supported by Tetra Pak, is calling on primary schools across the country to get involved in Tetra Pak Tree Day and plant a tree on Thursday, 1st October 2020. The theme for this year’s campaign is “Be a Force for Nature” to encourage primary school children around the country to become more active in sustainability and climate issues.
 
Tetra Pak Tree Day is an opportunity for children, teachers and parents to put down the school books, spend time outdoors and learn to become more environmentally aware. The campaign’s mascot Sammy Squirrel can be found on the back of Avonmore school milk cartons from September with simple tips on how to become more environmentally conscious.
 
As part of this year’s Tetra Pak Tree Day, 1,500 native tree saplings will be made available through the campaign website for primary schools to plant on their school grounds, or in a pot in the classroom. More details on the campaign including new class lessons, videos, information on recycling, food waste and nature walks can be found on www.treeday.ie
 
Joseph McConville, President of the Tree Council of Ireland, commented:

“The pandemic has allowed us all to re-evalute the things that really matter to us, and many of us are now treasuring the natural world and experiences with the environment more than ever. For this year’s Tetra Pak Tree Day, we are inviting schools to spend the day outside learning about trees and the natural environment. To help schools get on board, we’ve got over 1,500 FREE Scots Pine tree saplings for schools to plant – which is also one of the requirements to achieve the Green-School’s Green Flag for Biodiversity.”
 
Lyndsey LoydenEdwards, Key Account Director at Tetra Pak UK & Ireland, said: 

“For this year’s Tetra Pak Tree Day campaign, we want to encourage children, and those around them, to “be a force for nature”. More and more children are becoming anxious about climate change and, through the on-pack messages, this campaign gives them simple tools to directly connect with nature and really make a difference to the world around them.”
 
Each year Tetra Pak Tree Day places a focus on a different native tree and this year the chosen tree is the Scots Pine or An Giúis, one of Ireland’s few evergreen trees.  The seeds from the Scots Pine cones are one of the red squirrels’ favourite foods and honey bees use the tree’s resinous sap to make propolis or bee glue; a sealant for their hive that also protects them from bacteria and viruses.
 
To find out more about this year’s Tetra Pak Tree Day and to claim a FREE Scots Pine sapling for your school, visit www.treeday.ie.

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