Cape Town Green Map home page

Explore Cape Town's green spaces, nature reserves, organic eateries, farmers' markets, recycling drop-offs, sustainable living projects, eco products and other green choices by clicking the map's icons.
View a large version of the map, with a search function, here.

FoodTent solution to school feeding crisis

In response to an ever increasing feeding crisis in schools with feeding schemes, which often battle to source and secure supplies of nutritious food, the City’s Environmental Resource Management Department’s Youth Environmental School (YES) team took on this challenge.

Cape Town assesses the future of its coastline

Most of us have heard that the sea level is rising and with a huge chunk of ice the size of Luxembourg breaking away from the Antarctica last week, its not surprising that the people of Cape Town should be concerned about rising sea levels.

Ancient trees, lush green lawns across which squirrels are scampering, pigeons are squabbling. Add to this beautiful ponds and water lilies, and you have a rich, diverse garden - in the middle of a big city? Yes. The Company's Garden is one of South Africa’s oldest pieces of cultivated land. Jan van Rieebeck founded the garden on the instructions of the Dutch East India Company to create a food garden to supply passing ships. Today the garden is located in the middle of Cape Town's CBD.

As more of us become aware of the advantages of planting indigenous species (or even better locally indigenous) in our gardens, we also need to understand and care for the creatures that join us in our gardens. Many are wrongly perceived as problems or pests and sometimes killed, but armed with a bit of knowledge we learn that most are allies that need to be protected.

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Farmers / Local Market

Sells regionally grown produce. May sell organic or traditional foods in a lively permanent or temporary setting. Food does not travel far, so it’s fresh and nutritious. May sell flowers, craft items, baked goods, wine, wool, and even regional cookbooks. Shopping here directly supports small family farms, local economies and a greener countryside.

Green tip

Follow the French diet

Oprah has been banging on for years about how French women seem to eat whatever they like and never put on weight. Having been present at more than one French campsite boule competion over the years, where the dress code is a Speedo and slops, I’m not convinced that the effect ex-tends to French men, but the principle of the ‘good food diet’ is definitely sound. Every cooking enthusiast I know has two things in common: an ob-session with cooking from scratch with fresh ingredients and a good figure.

Educating the future

Students from 14 schools in the Metropole Central Education District are involved in a one year project which is aimed at educating children about water, waste management, energy efficiency and re-cycling.

Wine with a lighter footprint

South African winemakers are starting to introduce lighter wine bottles into their collections to help off-set their carbon footprints.

Sales of individually packaged SA wines in the UK rose by 11 percent in 2009, and in 2008 this country's wine earned in excess of R6 billon in foreign exchange. But the increase in sales means that the carbon footprint has also increased, a fact that eco-conscience consumers in foreign markets concerned about climate change and food miles, will be aware of.