For the last 25 years WOMADelaide has lead the nation and won many awards for the environmental initiatives to reduce waste, offset the festival’s carbon footprint and educate and inspire the audience. One of WOMADelaide’s most successful projects is a 12 year partnership with Australia's largest environmental organisation Greening Australia to offset the carbon footprint of the festival. This project has seen $2 from every WOMADelaide ticket purchased invested in restoring a former cleared area with more than 70,000 native trees planted across 65 hectares to establish the WOMAD Forest, offsetting over 17,000 tonnes of carbon emissions. In 2018, WOMADelaide will establish a second WOMAD forest on Kangaroo Island in partnership with Greening Australia.

In collaboration with Adelaide Green Clean and Jeffries, WOMADelaide’s zero-waste initiatives also continue to lead the nation with 98% of all festival waste now diverted away from landfill and over 16 tonnes of mulch created from compostable waste collected at the festival returned to the Botanic Gardens of South Australia each year. Another major environmental initiative for 2018 will see WOMADelaide abolish all sales of water in plastic PET bottles at the festival, with patrons encouraged to bring their own bottles that can be filled at free water stations. WOMADelaide also leads the way in promoting bike transport and has collaborated with SunTrix to provide a solar lighting solution to the festival’s festoon lighting.

WOMADelaide extends this commitment to reducing carbon emissions by educating and inspiring the festival’s audience as well. WOMADelaide’s Planet Talks has become established over the last five years as one of the nation’s leading forums for sustainability discussions, attracting some of the world’s most respected and inspirational thinkers, activists, scientists, business leaders, politicians, writers and more. 

Visit the WOMADelaide website.