Mundulla is SA’s most sustainable community and township.
A strong and vibrant small community, Mundulla, has been named the Overall Winner of the 2015 KESAB Sustainable Communities Awards.
It is one of SA’s smallest towns, 270 km south east of Adelaide between Bordertown and Padthaway close to the Victorian Border – but it has a community spirit that seemingly never rests.
Mundulla has been successful in the KESAB Sustainable Communities Awards in the past years, winning Best Small Town a number of times, as well as category awards, but this is their first time being awarded with the highest honour. Along with the Overall win, Mundulla also won Best Small Town and the Appearance, Amenities and Facilities category.
KESAB’s Sustainable Communities awards recognises dedication, effort and motivation to enhance local regional and rural communities. Over 150 category entries were received this year, including entries from towns or organisations that have previously not been involved. Entrants stretched as far as Fowlers Bay in the West, Farina in the North, Mt Gambier in the South, Monash in the Riverland and Kangaroo Island.
“Long-term sustainable practices are now entrenched in how communities manage local issues and the 2015 awards will showcase the best examples across a range of focused categories,” said KESAB environmental solutions Executive Director, John Phillips OAM. “The awards have grown from being an anti-litter campaign to encompass initiatives as diverse as preserving heritage, saving water and energy, community action and leadership, embracing health and wellbeing and of course encouraging recycling and reuse of materials.”
Awards Judge, Alex Hammett, said the small, tight knit community presented such a strong demonstration of a sustainable community that Mundulla was the clear winner in 2015. “Mundulla is a small town with a very proactive mindset. Their projects may not be huge in scale or budget, but they are often quite unique. This year, a key focus of their submission was the Parklands walking track which has been enhanced with creative signage and sculptures. It generates a sense of imagination and discovery to wander through parklands and take note of your surroundings.”
Mundulla has been part of Sustainable Communities for a number of years, and previously participated in the Tidy Towns awards. Like many towns, Mundulla was disappointed when the Tidy Towns program finished, after participating in that program for many years.
However, they have now embraced the Sustainable Communities Awards, making the comment “We appreciate that Sustainable Communities is a whole year program, and that it’s not just how the town is presented on the day of judging.”
Mundulla will now become the SA finalist at the Keep Australia Beautiful National Tidy Towns Awards to be held in Toodyay, WA in March 2016. The Australian Tidy Towns Awards are sponsored by the Australian Packaging Covenant and the Department for the Environment.
Awards were presented to winning towns, councils, schools and communities representing all corners of the State in South Australia’s longest serving and largest community environmental ongoing initiative.
The overall Sustainable Communities Winner was presented at the Adelaide Entertainment Centre this afternoon by the Hon. Ian Hunter MLC, Minister for Sustainability, Environment and Conservation.
Also announced on the day was the Clean Beaches winner for 2015. Our winner Victor Harbor will represent SA in the Australian Clean Beaches Awards, to be held in 2016.
Complimentary to the awards, this year KESAB organised a special Waste & Sustainability EXPO to coincide with the large visitation of entrants to Adelaide for the awards event. This enabled new town entrants, councils and progress associations to see what others are doing, to learn from others and to speak to the SA eco-sustainable businesses about their services.
“This was a good opportunity to get all the people with the one mindset in one room to learn from each other,” said John Phillips
Major Award Winners
Best Small Town – Mundulla
Best Medium Town – Joint Winner – Ardrossan
Best Medium Town – Joint Winner – Barmera
Best Large Town – Mount Gambier
Council Project of the Year – Whyalla City Council; Whyalla Wetlands Upgrade
Community Project of the Year – Ardrossan Progress Association; Ardrossan Town Square
School Project of the Year- Investigator College; Currency Creek Site enhancements
Clean Beaches Winner – Victor Harbor.
Mundulla is SA’s most sustainable community & township.
