Bar Trigona and PENICILLIN are saving the trees one cocktail at a time. By Holly Graham.
Bar Trigona – consecutive winner of the Sustainable Bar Award at Asia’s 50 Best Bars 2019 and 2020 – has launched the “A Tree Today, A Forest Tomorrow” project.
The bar has always been a leader in sustainability and supporting local communities, activating initiatives like its Adopt A Hive program to save the bees, and this new project aims to support Malaysian forestland and local farming communities.
Every time guests order one of four special cocktails showcasing a local fruit at Bar Trigona, MYR5 goes towards planting fruit trees at local farms – specifically mangifera and citrus species which grow quickly and fruit in a few years. The reforestation will not only encourage local wildlife to return, restoring the area’s biodiversity, it will also help farmers by controlling flooding and erosion, and replenishing the soil with vital nutrients.
Bar Trigona has teamed up with long-time partner Ong Ning-Geng, cacao farmer and owner of Chocolate Concierge to assist in the project. Ning and his team will use the proceeds for seed collection, planting and protection of the farm. Bar Trigona along with Ning and team aim to plant a minimum of 500 trees every year.
Contributions of MYR200 or more get a tree named after the donor, as well as the chance to harvest its fruits in the future. Once the tree begins fruiting, donors receive a jar of homemade mead, jam or kombucha.
Alongside tree plantation, proceeds from cocktail sales will also go towards establishing new beehives, with the Adopt a Hive initiative continuing. For more information, click here.
Over in Hong Kong, newly opened PENICILLIN by Agung Prabowo and team has launched a cocktail called One Penicillin, One Tree, described as a climate positive cocktail that would make Sir David Attenborough proud. For every cocktail sold, one native one Mallotus Muticus tree is planted in the endangered Kalimantan rainforest area in Borneo, Indonesia. These trees are a fast-growing upper canopy tree that reach up to 42 meters in height and live for more than 200 years.
The initiative is in partnership with ecoSPIRITS who has partnered with the Green Steps Group, which provides verified “proof of planting” technology to ensure reforestation is sustainable and long-lasting. ecoSPIRITS is the world’s first closed loop spirits technology, with each ecoSPIRITS based cocktail saving an average of 150 grams of C02 emissions. All bars using ecoSPIRITS plant trees as the purchase of one 4.5l ecoTOTE results in the planting of a tree.
