OUR MISSION

“We aim to host a premier music and lifestyle festival in an environmentally and social responsible manner under the motto of ‘Play Hard, Tread Lightly’.”

The Green Goals of Rocking the Daisies are an integral part of implementing festival in an eco-friendly and sustainable way and have been developed over the last few years. Every year we take the following steps to achieve these goals in order to ensure that we continue to “Tread Lightly”:

OVERVIEW

Winner of numerous Environmental Awards, the festival aims to achieve as close to carbon neutrality as possible by offsetting and extensive environmental policies, including:

A total of 16 120 kg of waste was recycled at the event (of a total 25 660 kg collected). The bulk of the waste was made of glass and metal with 24% waste going to landfill. This included:

Glass – 5120 kgs
Metal – 5600 kgs
Plastic – 2560 kgs
Cardboard – 2740 kgs

Other greening initiatives at the festival included:
• Pick n Pay joined the festival as the Official Greening Partner to the festival, contributing in several ways towards the extensive Greening iniatives – biodiesel, recycling bins, Like Bike, Cycling the Daisies, free drinking water points and more!
• The Green Village was a designated area that housed our eco partners, engaging green initiatives, the Capitec Swap Shop, The Hemporium Acoustic Stage, Pick n Pay Recycling, Greenpop photobooth and pledge area, Food and Trees for Africa pledge tree, the Sunflower Fund, workshops, music and loads more .
• Power used from the grid was purchased prior to the festival, in the form of Renewable Energy Credits, contributing to renewable energy production and ensuring we ran the festival off renewable clean power. This came from the Darling Wind Farm.
• All generators were powered by bio-diesel generators produced from used vegetable oil sponsored by Pick n Pay.
• Solar, wind and kinetic power was used in different areas around the festival, but specifically at the Green Village.
• To further reduce energy consumption LED lighting was included in all areas of the festival, where LED could not be used, incandescents were used.
• 100% biodegradable soaps and shampoos were supplied to all festival goers in the showers.
• Woshbox toilets ran on LED and solar power.
• All portable ablution fluids were natural, organic biological solutions that are eco-friendly and health risk free.
• All Festival merchandise was produced from locally produced cotton.
• All posters and flyers were printed on fully recycled paper, the number of flyers was also reduced from 20 000 to 15 000 in an effort to conserve paper.
• No festival magazine was produced this year, but rather a festival phone app, in an effort to reduce consumption of paper.
• 100% biodegradable soaps and detergents were supplied to all festival restaurants.
• Participating restaurants were instructed to use 100% biodegradable food packaging.
• The venue, Cloof Wine Estate, is a biodiversity champion, contributing to the re-growth of indigenous fauna and flora unique to that area.
• 107 cyclists participated in an official carbon neutral cycle trip, which gave them a discount on the ticket and raised awareness about green transport as well as contributing to reducing the festivals carbon footprint.
• 110 festival goers literally “walked the distance” and walked to Rocking the Daisies, further creating awareness of the natural flora up the west coast and reducing carbon footprints.
• Pick n Pay donated a bike to the Darling Trust for every 10km cycled on the Pick n Pay “Like Bike”.
• Any remaining items from the Capitec Swap Shop were donated to the Darling Trust.
• At Sowing the Seeds CPT 2011, a Daisy Train was chartered to transport festival-goers to Simon’s Town and back. Once in Simon’s Town, bus shuttles transported people to the venue in Scarborough and
back. This not only drove sustainable transport, but also encouraged responsible driving.
• RTD encouraged festival-goers to car-share to get to the festival. An online car-pooling portal was advertised on the RTD site prior to the festival called goCarShare, which connected people with empty cars to people looking for a ride to the festival.
• Bus shuttles were hired to reduce the number of cars.
• Overall as the organisers, the biggest achievement was the awareness created through all of these initiatives combined and the lasting positive longterm effects we have created.
• Please Note: This is a snapshot of the efforts – for a full report, please our Sustainability Report 2012 (available on request).

“Although this environmental analysis reflects Rocking the Daisies, practices were mirrored for Sowing the Seeds.”
Here is the 2012 report for you to replace on the pdf icon.