October the 14th, 2024 – Around 300 selfless Croatian volunteers have been planting trees as part of Boranka 2024, a well known reforestation mission done each year.
As Morski writes, the well known Boranka project is the largest volunteer reforestation mission tackling burned areas in Croatia, specifically across Dalmatia. It is carried out with the aim of restoring burned areas and raising public awareness, especially among children (through educational activities in schools and kindergartens), about the importance of forests, nature protection, the consequences of climate change, and forest fire prevention.
“We’ve been planting new trees with around 300 volunteers, scouts, high school students and teachers from six different high schools, as well as with many residents of Grebaštica and Šibenik. It’s been a beautiful day, we’ve enjoyed wonderful views and we can see forest emerging on the site of the fire-ravaged Jelinjak hill near Šibenik,” said the Boranka 2024 volunteers. Their selfless deeds testify to true patriotism and love for their homeland in practice, not merely with a hand placed on the heart as the national anthem plays.
Boranka 2024, much like all Boranka missions thus far, is organised by the Association of Croatian Scouts, Croatian Forests (Hrvatske sume) and the Croatian Mountain Rescue Service (HGSS). When it comes to large fires, which are increasingly ravaging the Croatian coast and coastal areas each summer, extremely large areas of forest are tragically destroyed. Fiery elements leave behind desolation even when the flames are gone, and these have catastrophic natural consequences. Nature is powerless to defend itself against such tragedies and quickly restore itself. That’s why it needs our help, and the Boranka 2024 mission has been providing it with just that.
Boranka has otherwise been the winner of plenty of domestic and foreign awards. It’s the very first organisation from Croatia and the entire immediate region to win the most prestigious European award for marketing effectiveness – the Golden Euro Effie. The Scout Association of Croatia also received a national award for volunteerism, and in February 2020, it became the proud holder of the “Pride of Croatia/Ponos Hrvatske” award.
Boranka and the Association of Scouts of Croatia also won the exceptional European award “European Citizen’s Prize” for the year 2020. That was awarded by the European Parliament for having made an exceptional contribution to the spread of European values. In less than two years, the Boranka campaign has become the most awarded non-profit campaign in Croatia in history.
