Alma Resort Cam Ranh is encouraging the young and the young at heart to roll up their sleeves and get their hands dirty in the name of the environment.
From Monday to Sunday between 3pm-4pm, the award-winning resort’s Kid’s Club offers its “Green Hands, Green Future Tree Planting Activity”.
Green thumbs choose between planting three different trees; a Golden Bell, a Bauhinia variegata or a coconut Tree. Participants receive a personalised name tag for their tree as well as regular photo updates of its progress.
“Leave your mark on our resort by selecting from three tree species that each have significant meaning,” said Alma’s managing director Herbert Laubichler-Pichler. “A Golden Bell is a symbol of wealth in Fen Shui planted to attract prosperity. A Bauhinia variegata represents beauty, grace and life’s transient nature. A Coconut tree is renowned as the ‘tree of life’ symbolizing generosity and resilience.”
The trees are planted along the resort’s lush “Walking Street” bookended by the Kid’s Club to the south and Youth Club to the north. The path, affectionately dubbed “The Walk of Green” by staff due to the increasing number of trees planted by guests flanking its sides, passes by restaurants Asiana, La Casa, Alma Lounge, and Alma Garden.
The tree planting initiative is the latest of a string of measures by the resort to lessen its carbon footprint.
Alma is in the process of implementing what is believed to be Vietnam’s most ambitious solar power project, installing 4476 solar panels totalling 23,290 square metres on the roofs of its 196 pavilions, two V-shaped towers housing 384 suites, lobby lounge and utility building. With a capacity of 2462 kilowatts peak – the rate at which it generates energy at its peak performance on a sunny day – the solar power system will fuel between a quarter to almost 35 percent of Alma’s energy needs, depending on occupancy dictated by the low and high seasons.
In a bid to be more sustainable and self-sufficient, Alma also has its own onsite Herb Garden, Nursery Garden and Chicken Farm, providing fresh produce and eggs served at Alma’s restaurants. The resort has started running complimentary guided garden tours to equip guests with handy tips on how to nurture their own veggie patch and look after chickens. Alma is also planning to roll out cooking classes by the garden, where guests pick, clean, and cook their own healthy meals.
In addition to employing a full-time sustainability officer and engaging staff in sustainability initiatives as part of three staff committees focused on ‘green products’, ‘innovation and solutions’ and ‘people and partnerships’, Alma is home to a water treatment plant, electric buggy station, recycling in its garbage room and paperless solutions due to its Alma App.
The 325sqm water treatment plant deploys a reverse osmosis system to provide 20,000L weekly of ice for all the resort’s kitchens. The garbage room processes about 250 kilograms of garbage a day, including compostable waste and recyclables, reselling an average of, for example, 110 litres of cooking oil weekly to non-food businesses so that it is recycled. The resort’s 360sqm buggy station’s 36 electric buggies each take an average of six hours to charge.
The 30-hectare resort was recently called out as the No. 1 resort in Southeast Asia, the No. 2 resort in Asia and No. 9 resort worldwide in this year’s Travel + Leisure’s World’s Best Awards. The US-based publication announced the winners of its World’s Best Awards on July 9, with Alma scoring 99.2 on the awards’ 100-point survey. The World’s Best Awards are widely considered to be one of the two most important awards in the worldwide hospitality industry.
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