Fully aware that the earth’s limited resources must be handled with great care, Jongkind supports the Responsibly Produced Peat (RPP) initiative: an independent European certification system for peat producers who exploit peat in a responsible way.
RPP-certified peat producers can prove that the peat they exploit and/or produce conforms to the principles and criteria of RPP.
This means for example:
- no peat is exploited in untouched natural peatlands with a high ecological value;
- peat exploitation is followed by a recovery plan in which biodiversity and the growth of new peat are given priority;
- maximising the extraction of peat from already degraded peatlands leads to a win-win situation for nature and the peat industry;
- fruitful cooperation between peat producers and environmental organisations.
The aim to maximise the responsible production of peat serves two important benefits: - Availability: guaranteeing that sufficient peat of high quality remains available for a long time, in particular for applications resulting in greater added value.
- Responsibility: guaranteeing that peat is extracted only from specific sources and peatlands, and not from areas with high natural values and/or a high biodiversity, and guaranteeing responsible after-use of the peat-extraction sites.
- More information on RPP can be found at the website www.responsiblyproducedpeat.org.