PP Ian Bentley introduced Ian McRae, who told us about TreeProject, which is a non-profit, non-government, volunteer-based organisation leading the way in sustainable re-vegetation throughout Victoria by providing low cost indigenous seedlings to landholders and landcare groups.
Ian McRae told us how his interest in the environment had led him to the Tree Project: at an AGM he found himself elected Secretary and he has become more and more involved. He illustrated his talk with a number of highly informative slides.
He started with environmental and re-vegetation issues, and how in 1906 it was first decided that re-vegetation was required to repair loss of vegetation, land degradation and other environmental problems.
In describing how TreeProject works, he showed how landowners place orders for lots of 500 plants, and volunteer growers propagate indigenous seedlings in their own backyards. Other volunteers run fundraising, administration depot management and courier services.
His slides clearly showed how volunteers were carefully raising the seedlings, which were then distributed to the landowners at low cost, mainly in the Re-Tree Scheme.
Other projects involve Ribbons of Green which involves local councils providing areas for tree-planting, Koala corridors in the Mornington Peninsula, project in the Upper Murray area and Mallacoota involving Rotary and Lions Clubs.
He described their current challenges to find new landholders, more donors, new couriers, and moving to modern systems and keeping up with OH&S, and child safety regulations.
Ian answered a number of questions before being thanked by Doug McLean, who revealed his own career had shown him the benefits of tree replanting.
Ian McRae (right) had a long career in finance, IT and banking software, with a consultancy to a number of businesses , before becoming involved in TreeProject.