Oxfam Trailwalker Wins Top Environment Award Third Straight Year

Oxfam New Zealand’s annual fundraising event, Oxfam Trailwalker, has again won Best Environmentally Sustainable Event at the Event Industry Awards for its Taupo-based team challenge. This is the third successive year that the international development organisation has won the New Zealand Association of Event Professionals accolade.

Oxfam Trailwalker attracted 1044 participants in April 10-11 this year, with more than 3000 support crew involved. The event sees teams of four walking or running a 100km off-road trail in under 36 hours to raise money for Oxfam’s work.

The judges hailed Oxfam Trailwalker as an event that ‘walks the talk’ when it comes to environmental sustainability. Oxfam New Zealand’s events team and partner Total Sport were also awarded runners up in the Best Partnership category, recognised for their best practice sharing and innovation throughout the Xterra Auckland trail run series.

“It’s a huge achievement to be recognised for the third year running for our commitment to environmental sustainability,” said Kirsten Bird, Oxfam’s Events Operations Coordinator.

“Ultimately we hope that our success empowers the events industry and our participants to make environmental sustainability a priority every day."

Bird said some of the measures that contributed to the Environmental Sustainability award included: setting tangible reduction goals based on 2009 Instep measured event data; sticking to the basics of ‘reduce, reuse, recycle’; developing internal ‘green events guidelines’; developing systems to tangibly measure energy and water consumption, waste water and landfill volumes; and communicating this to participants.

The awards are judged by a panel of industry specialists from throughout New Zealand who have been selected across various event disciplines.

Almost $860,000 was raised from Oxfam Trailwalker 2010 in support of Oxfam’s aid and development work in the Pacific, East Asia and Africa. Oxfam New Zealand works with developing communities to access safe water and sanitation, to build sustainable livelihoods, to provide education and healthcare and to live free from persecution and violence.

For more information or to sign up for Oxfam Trailwalker 2011, visit www.oxfamtrailwalker.org.nz