Lafarge quarry wins wildlife award

Lafarge Aggregates & Concrete UK’s Whisby Quarry has won two awards in a prestigious nature competition.

The site, near Lincoln, was recognised in the ‘medium quarry class’ in the BTO EDF Energy Business Bird Challenge 2010, winning both the Conservation award and the Community award.

Awards are given to sites where birds thrive and initiatives are undertaken to protect, enhance and promote biodiversity.

Whisby’s success in the Community category comes thanks to the close relationship between the quarry operators Lafarge and Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust, which leases a restored area.

In the Conservation category the site was applauded for the creation of a sand martin bank and habitat reclamation to encourage birds such as nightingale and warbler whose numbers have dropped by more than half nationally since 1995.

David Park, regional restoration manager for Lafarge said: “Whisby is a formal industrial site that is now a wonderful public amenity enjoyed by tens of thousands of people every year and also provides habitat for a wide range of bird and animal species.

“It is a fantastic example of the positive lasting legacy the extraction industry can provide for generations to come once operations have finished and is a testament to the management undertaken by the Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust.

“People might not link the Whisby Nature Reserve which exists now with sand and gravel quarrying but the fact is without Lafarge’s excavations on that site the reserve would not have been created.

“Lafarge is immensely proud of its restoration record and it is an honour to receive recognition from such a significant organisation as the BTO.”