For the fourth year in a row, the Estrella Damm N.A. Andalucía Masters demonstrated its commitment to the environment by organizing a clean-up of the Sotogrande beach with the students of the International School and DP World Tour players Nicolai Højgaard and Thorbjørn Olesen.
This initiative is part of the DP World Tour's Green Drive programme, which promotes sustainability in all of the circuit's activities and practices, with a special interest in generating a positive impact on the places where it holds its events. Raising awareness among children about the need to take care of natural resources is, without a doubt, a commitment to the future for a greener society.
A hundred kids from the International School of Sotogrande and several teachers have participated in this activity that playfully allowed them to realize the human impact on nature, since, despite being an apparently clean beach, they collected a lot of waste and microplastics with the help of Danish players Nicolai Højgaard and Thorbjørn Olesen.
Thorbjørn Olesen was delighted to accompany the children as he considers himself a great lover of nature and believes that we all need to do a little more for the environment.
“I've been skiing since I was a child, I love the mountains and nature is part of my life. For the last five or six years I have been much more aware that we should do more to improve our environment, especially we who travel a lot by plane,” the Dane stated.
In the same vein, Nicolai Højgaard stressed that he would like to do this kind of activity more often.
“Sometimes we take for granted that the beaches are clean and well maintained, but we don't realize that it's also up to us.”
When he's not competing in some tournament, Højgaard really enjoys taking long walks outdoors with his dog and is convinced that taking care of the environment depends on everyone.
“We golfers travel a lot by plane and that causes a negative impact, all the more reason we have to participate in initiatives like this and, above all, keep this attitude in mind in our day-to-day lives.”
When he is not competing in a tournament, Højgaard enjoys taking long walks outdoors with his dog and is convinced that caring for the environment depends on everyone.
“We golfers travel a lot by plane and that causes a negative impact, all the more reason we have to participate in initiatives like this and, above all, keep this attitude in mind in our day-to-day lives.”
Both the players and the children had a good time and at the same time managed to remove a lot of waste, especially plastic, from the beach.
The Green Drive programme is part of the DP World Tour's Golf for Good initiative, which is a benchmark in the world of sport and, among other objectives, has set itself the goal of reducing its carbon emissions by 50% by 2030, and reaching net zero in carbon emissions by 2040.
In addition, as part of this programme, a new pioneering tool has been implemented in professional golf that allows DP World Tour players to calculate and offset their greenhouse gas emissions when traveling during tournaments.
Tickets for the Estrella Damm N.A. Andalucía Masters are already available, with discounts for members of the federation (and their families/friends) and free access for children under 13, and can be purchased here.
The Estrella Damm N.A. Andalucía Masters, an event in the DP World Tour’s Race to Dubai made possible by the essential contribution of the Real Club de Golf Sotogrande, is sponsored by Estrella Damm and the Junta de Andalucía, jointly funded by the EU and was declared Event of Exceptional Public Interest by the Government of Spain.
