Arnold Schwarzenegger, a celebrity chef, and several German actors are sponsoring ancient olive trees on the island of Crete in Greece. Their donations and the resulting publicity help preserve these impressive Greek natural monuments, which are in danger of destruction due to financial pressures and inadequate awareness of their multi-faceted value.
The German celebrity chef Alfons Schuhbeck learned about these olive trees from his German-Greek friend Karl Röske, who started a campaign to save them in 2020. Given his great appreciation for Crete, Cretans, and their olive oil, Schuhbeck was glad to sponsor a tree. He told his friend Arnold Schwarzenegger about the campaign, according to Rethemnos News, and then Schwarzenegger also became a “green guardian angel” for an ancient Cretan olive tree.
Schwarzenegger’s sponsorship of an ancient tree that can remove a substantial amount of carbon from the atmosphere is not as surprising as fans of his action movies might think. “Arnold Schwarzenegger has been fighting pollution and climate change for nearly 20 years,” according to the website of the international Schwarzenegger Climate Initiative, which he founded after supporting many environmentalist standards and solutions as governor of California. No longer portraying a terminator on the silver screen, Schwarzenegger now seeks to help preserve the health of the planet.
While Schwarzenegger may not have had the opportunity to visit Crete yet, Karl Röske has enjoyed visiting his mother’s homeland since childhood. He also traveled extensively during a television career focused on hunting for beneficial plants and highlighting the value of biodiversity. Last year, Röske settled on the island and founded Cretan Aenaon to help preserve Crete’s aged olive trees, which are in danger of being cut down for firewood or tourists’ souvenirs, or to make way for new crops. Moreover, entire trees are sometimes uprooted and sold to gardeners abroad.