The Trail Chasers

RMB Ultra-Trail Cape Town: The Place We Run. Sustaining the Cederberg

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“Yes, use the mountains and the trails, but come with two visions. Come enjoy the Cederberg for what it is, but come with another vision and say, what good can I do for this environment?” Dawie Burger, founder of Sustainable Ceder 

In this special bonus episode of The RMB UTCT (Place We Run) Series, Host Dean Horwitz is joined by Dawie Burger, founder of Sustainable Ceder, to discuss their ambitious mission to restore the Cederberg's endangered Clanwilliam Cedars and inspire a community-led conservation movement. 

🎯 In this episode, you’ll hear: 

✅ The critical mission to restore the Cederberg's endangered Clanwilliam Ceder by planting 10,000 saplings a year

✅ Why donations aren't just financial, and how you can contribute your specific skills to help 

✅ How true sustainability is a "triangle" that links environmental work, community upliftment, and tourism

✅ How funding from partners like the RMB UTCT Trail Fund "takes a mountain off" the shoulders of "doers," letting them focus on their work in the veld (field)

Whether you're an ultra-runner or just love exploring wild places, this episode will fundamentally change the way you see our responsibility to "The Place We Run."

This Special Edition of the Trail Chasers Podcast is proudly sponsored by RMB.

Enjoying the season? Subscribe, leave a review, and tag @trailchaserspod to share your biggest takeaway from Dawie's message.

SPEAKER_00:

Welcome back to the Place We Run, our special trail tracer series proudly sponsored by RB. Our exploration of responsibility doesn't end on Table Mountain. The RB UTCT Trail Fund supports critical work in wild places far beyond the city. In this bonus episode, we head to the Cedarberg, a place of ancient beauty and urgent challenges. I sit down with Darby Berger, founder of Sustainable Cedar, to find out what it truly means to earn our time on the trails.

SPEAKER_01:

Darby, welcome to the Trail Chasers. So let's start at the beginning, you know. Who are you? What do you do? Where do you live? Yeah, tell me, tell me more.

SPEAKER_02:

So basically, I've been living out here in the southern Cedarburg for the last 17 years with my wife, just doing tourism stuff, campsite, and houses, and started to work with Quentin from the Lippard Trust with a lot of conservationists, and just grew that into even more conservation work and awareness stuff.

SPEAKER_01:

So when did Sustainable Cedar start and what kind of was the background and the mission to kind of starting it?

SPEAKER_02:

It started two years back, 2023, about October. We said, okay, let's do this full-time while we're running a tourism farm. I think it started because we were so entwined with all the conservation entities, like doing the real hands-on work on the field and really observing stuff. And over time we really realized, especially over COVID time, we realized like, you know, we all say, oh, someone's gonna come into the Cedarberg and come do conservation work on the Cedars, someone's gonna do it full-time, you know, and our clock is also ticking. And what really bothered me is like the Cedar Trees, Clint Williams Cedar Trees, is right like on top of like almost like the key chain of conservation up here in the Cedarberg. It's what the Cedarberg is known for. And that bothered me that there's no one doing it full-time. And I just said, listen, let's drive it because we're heart and soul in the Cedarberg, but let's drive it. And I contacted Helen from the Lippertrust, and she said to me, Dolby, we'll support you, start an NPO, nonprofit organization, and drive it. You know, we do have the passion for the Cedarberg from the environmental and community side, and that's where we are.

SPEAKER_01:

In terms of you know, sustainable Cedarberg, you know, what what are you kind of, I guess, day-to-day? What are your duties? You know, as you kind of mentioned, your main goal, I guess, is you know, is the conservation around the sort of cedar trees, you know, but what does that kind of mean in uh in a practical purpose, in practical events?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, so on the one side we run a tourism farm. We run about 25 campsites and a few houses, and then vignettes and truffle field. But we also drive the conservation passion side, creating awareness these days about the Cedarberg, especially because it got so busy after COVID. And we just realized we need to spread more awareness about conservation. We do know the shortfall of conservation in the Cedarberg, the management side of it. We do support Cape Nature, and they support us a lot because we do this full-time. And I think it's quite a nice balance between a private, let's say a private passion entity with a government entity to work both together on on these challenges, on these daily challenges. I mean, just from COVID, just from flooding, fires, just coordinating all these different projects and uh also initiatives. And yeah, that's where growing also with the trail running community, even on that side, it started to really grow. And even the initiatives that's coming from that is really helping the Cedarberg as well.

SPEAKER_01:

Moving on to trail running and the Cedarberg getting a lot more busier. Obviously, you've seen like a massive influx into the Cedarberg. So, in terms of sustainability, you know, how are you kind of tackling that?

SPEAKER_02:

Luckily, it's southern Cedarberg is limited, especially with accommodation. So there's only so many people that can really come up here, visit it. And most people visit this area from I would say September, October when it slightly warms up. Winter times can be quite marsh up here. We can have a minimum of about 10, 9 degrees. That's not ideal for camping at all. It's well so a lot of this time I'm really busy because we do have a lot of school groups. We also do have a lot of trail running events going on in the Cedarberg. So, yeah, it does have challenges, but it's all about linking with the trail run entities and see what part of the Cedarberg they can use. So that not all the entities is focused on just let's say on more the commercial routes, almost like the Wolfbook Arch, all the cracks, the multiscross now. So it's quite nice to diverse that. And I think it's all about communication and getting everyone on the same page, probably. That helps a lot so that we can disperse these events and also talk about our challenges that we face in the Cedarberg from a management side.

SPEAKER_01:

I guess the golden question here is what is a race on Table Mountain and have to do with the Cedarberg. So talk me through the link with UTCT and the Trail Fund. How did that come about and how does that partnership work?

SPEAKER_02:

I think in life, what I picked up with conservation and and in life in general, Western Cape is small. It's like you walk just half an hour and you walk into someone you know. And a lot of people visit the Cedarberg, and we've been linking with so many individuals, creating awareness. I think for the last easily for the last 12-15 years, we've been creating awareness of conservation and and things. And I think there's just people that you meet, and yeah, they run these great initiatives and trail running groups and stuff. And you know, that's also a great way to push back into the Cedarberg. Event in Cape Town can be large numbers, but up here it's more of a almost like exclusive, and it's quite wild as well. And we have a lot to offer from rock formations, our diversity. You can have some of the routes, you can have all for yourself. If you know where to run in the Cedarberg, you can have it all for yourself. But we do we do keep ourselves up to date what's happening in the trail run communities in Cape Town and their challenges over there. But I think yeah, linking back to people, you know, that's really supporting us. It's just help to support these projects. I mean, it would not be possible from RB or Tuesday Trails. I mean, the funds we receive, helping to do environmental projects, but also community upliftment projects and spreading awareness in the same. So it's like a triangle from all these different things that's really important for the bigger picture. Just environmental stuff or just community stuff or just doing tourism. I think if you do a bit of everything in the bigger run and in the long run, that's more sustainable because you're growing your network and that really can push back into the Cedarberger as well.

SPEAKER_01:

Obviously, the money element, the funds element of it is massive, you know. But how big is the kind of awareness, you know, that people come to UTCT and they see that you're one of the initiatives that are involved and getting that kind of feedback and that kind of spotlight shone on you. How big is that for you guys?

SPEAKER_02:

I think it's much bigger than we can actually pick up from our side. We recently did a campaign where we were on a short list for European funding, and we could see that our message was going across the world through so many different countries, and that's special. And it shows you that it's your network that's growing, and it's not something that you built up yesterday, it's something we've been building for years. When you start an NPO, you need to then start building your network. But in this case, first build your network, then starting your NPO, because then you've done almost kind of your homework, you know where to take this projects and initiatives, and you know who you can ask a favor for, you know, because they know you're here for the long run. And that's what's nice all about trail run entities, especially the guys that are here for the long run, having this open space, but pushing back into this open space because we want to protect it. And and yes, so there's so much work that needs to be done, but it's what it's not that it's not possible. I mean, it's from alien clearing and foot park maintenance, almost the same stuff you have in Cape Town. We uh at least don't have the security issue.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, and I mean that actually leads into my next question is you know, how closely do you work with the likes of Friends of Table Mountain and you know, the guys over here, you know, to kind of share knowledge, share resources and the like.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, so I follow Andy Davis for the Friends of Table Mountain. They're doing amazing work there on Table Mountain, and I do see that same thing happening in the Cedarburg as well, where we work with Cape Nature, working on footpaths, working on some of the mountain huts, and also linking the community. There's beautiful community villages that trail run entities can use, and you build it into your trail, and the community benefits out of that. So much more actually comes. You know, they start associating with people, and I think they also broaden their knowledge and their self-esteem, and that's really beautiful. I think 10, 15 years back, when you were speaking to a local guy, let's say in the Vupertal area or smaller communities, and you were speaking English, they would run away. Nowadays you can actually have conversations with people of the local community.

SPEAKER_01:

So I think we're really in a good pod currently or good time frame to initiate these good causes, expanding on the RB involvement and UTCT involvement beyond those kind of, as we said, the funds. What does it mean that someone like a UCCT or someone like an RB not only kind of says, here's the money, but also says, We see you, we see the work that you do, and we want to get involved. What does that mean for you guys?

SPEAKER_02:

It takes a mountain off our shoulders because you know we're the doers, we're the farmers in the felt, we actually get the job done, we coordinate it, logistics, we breath a lot, so we we use is that typical you go sleep, but something you need to figure out for yourself. Um, and that helps when you have the financial support, then your dreams or your initiatives and ideas, or let's say, even in the trail run community, someone comes up with an initiative and says, Darby, I can help over here, and at least you have the funding, you know, that can uh deliver. So that takes a lot of pressure for us. If I need to go and do proposals the whole time, you don't get to the doing work. So you can almost financial side for someone else, and we can just focus on the doing work and the recipe of planting cedars and getting community involved. I mean, that's ideal. That's exactly where we want to be.

SPEAKER_01:

If someone comes across you for the first time at a wraith like UTCT, you know, what is the kind of key message that you would like them to take away from it? Or what is the vision or the idea that you want them to live with?

SPEAKER_02:

Yes, use the mountains and the trails, but come with two visions. You know, come with the Cedarberg and come enjoy the Cedarberg for what it is, but come with another vision and say, what can I do good for these environments? It's not always financial. It's like, you know, I'm a website builder. I can build a website for a local community campsite. It's what are you good at that can contribute to the bigger picture of the Cedarberg? That's going to make the Cedarberg sustainable. There's one thing that I always started to pick up every time, you know, someone would say, or a father or anyone that would say, No, but why are you doing that? That's Cape Nature's work. It's almost like the typical someone throwing litter out the car and saying, Okay, that's job creation. And it's the same concept. If we're all just gonna sit and wait, and hopefully something happens, you know, we might miss the bus, and at the end, you know, we're sitting with a Cedarberg full of invasive trees or mismanagement. We had massive erosion with the last two years of flooding. This year we have a very dry year. So, yeah, we constantly have these challenges, but I think the stronger, bigger the network, the more sustainable the Cedarberg can operate.

SPEAKER_01:

If someone does want to get involved, you know, as you said, beside from the financial contributions, you know, what are the kind of ways to get involved with you guys?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, we had recently started the Cedarberg Volunteer Group. You can send us an email or I've got my number available. I'm on social media as well. You can just contact us. We got a Cedarberg volunteer group where you can either get involved in all kinds of different things, like let's say it's uh either trail cleaning for a trail or it's even a community project. That's the way to get involved and even to coordinate a volunteer group. I mean, that's a job on its own. Do you need a person to coordinate a volunteer group? Because we don't want to miss our focus on cedars and community stuff.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. And you know, what does the future look like for the Cedarberg, for you know, sustainable cedar? What do you want it to kind of look like?

SPEAKER_02:

I think a beautiful picture for sustainable cedars, yes, we're doing restoration work on the claim William Cedar. We currently only have about 15,000 cedars left in the Cedarberg, quite mostly old cedars. So every year we're pushing to plant at least 10,000 saplings into these rocky areas where the fires don't really get to. So it's typical where the baboons back in the day, where the baboons actually took the seeds and and you know put it onto these rocky outcrops uh and really good moisture levels. So we where they really would start the regeneration sites, and then also the the community from young to old to get involved. We can spread a lot of awareness in schools and also amongst the communities, how to look after the environment, how to do the roads towards them, how to clean up their villages, to make it more tourism friendly, a few signs here and there, campsites, you know, initiatives to drive community into cooking their roasted brewhead, but also doing harvesting of high. So it's it's making those links, you know, because we are so into tourism over here, we know exactly what works and what doesn't work. But if we push that onto the community around us, then we know how to initiate it and make it sustainable, and they can just run with it. And the beautiful stories are there, and uh even look with the photos, it's it's magical places, so it's really nice for an international person to run or to drive there and visit these communities, and then you can actually go and plant seed with the community. Incredible.

SPEAKER_01:

Well, you guys are doing the most incredible work, so thank you very much. Hopefully, I can come visit you guys soon.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, definitely. It will be great to have you out here, Dean, and then I can showcase you a lot of stuff. Thank you so much for the chat. And also thank you for RB and Tuesday Trails and everyone in the trail around community. It's really helping a lot, and it's just beautiful building this network.

SPEAKER_01:

Amazing.

SPEAKER_02:

Thank you. All right, Dean. Cheers.