Coccinella Verified listing

We are Urban Non-profit Company (AMKE) Coccinella, a group of individuals committed to the sustainable management of the environment through initiatives, seminars, and nature-based visits.

Our main activities:

As part of our plan to highlight this unique cultural capital in the world, we launched a program to record centuries-old olive trees. For practical reasons, olive trees over 800 years old are included in it. Our purpose is to record and protect them with the cooperation of their owners - managers and where possible, to make them accessible, with appropriate signage and route planning. This way they will be used for the benefit of local communities.

To date, we have recorded 400 ancient olive trees, with an average age of approximately 1,350 years. The oldest olive tree we have documented is over 2,900 years old and is located in the village of Makrylia, Ierapetra.

At the same time, in order to raise awareness, we carry out various activities, such as workshops, visits to ancient olive groves, Environmental Education for citizens and schools, music events, and so on. We also collaborate with agencies, municipalities and the Region of Crete, to plan out to promote the ancient olive tree.

One of our most important initiatives is the creation of CULTURAL ROUTE IN CENTURY OLD OLIVES. We have designed six cultural routes through ancient olive groves, in collaboration with a network of 60 caretakers and cultivators of these historic trees. The detailed itinerary of the six routes is available on our website.

If you have perennial olive trees or would like to help us with this effort, feel free to contact us.