Covia is proud to renew its partnership with the Monarch Joint Venture (MJV) in 2025, building on the success of our 2024 collaboration. Last year’s efforts enabled the distribution of 5,000 milkweed plugs to Covia employees, enabling them to take an active role in vital conservation and biodiversity initiatives. The partnership also launched the transformation of 12 acres at our Cleburne, Texas, site into a thriving pollinator garden, supporting habitat restoration for monarch butterflies. 

Together, Covia and the Monarch Joint Venture (MJV) are working to safeguard the migratory monarch butterfly and other pollinators by advancing habitat conservation, education, and scientific outreach across the monarch’s range. This collaborative effort includes completing the multi-acre pollinator restoration project at Covia’s Cleburne plant and launching more exciting initiatives, like another employee engagement campaign and a new habitat project at the Roff, Oklahoma, plant. These actions reflect Covia’s ongoing commitment to biodiversity, sustainability, and community involvement, helping protect pollinators for generations to come.

Empowering Employees Through Habitat Action

Covia, with the help of MJV, will once again support employee education and involvement with another hands-on initiative to promote monarch-friendly habitat practices by engaging Covia team members across Covia’s footprint. This year, we will be distributing pollinator seed packets tailored to each Covia region. These region-specific mixes are designed to support local ecosystems by attracting and nourishing pollinators like bees and butterflies, helping to promote biodiversity and healthy habitats in the communities we live and work in. This initiative empowers team members to contribute directly to pollinator conservation at home. 

Advancing Biodiversity: Covia and MJV’s Ongoing Pollinator Habitat Initiative

For Cleburne’s pollinator habitat project, MJV provided guidance, expertise, and technical support throughout the process, including habitat layout design, site preparation, native plant selection, and dormant season seeding recommendations. The project remains on schedule, with seed for the 11.35-acre site currently stored on-site until fall, when Covia’s operations team will proceed with planting. This collaborative effort reflects Covia’s ongoing commitment to environmental stewardship and biodiversity enhancement.

Covia’s Roff, OK Plant Leads Habitat Restoration

Covia has designated its Roff, Oklahoma, facility as the primary site for its next phase of pollinator habitat restoration. Approximately 20 acres are being prepared for seeding by winter.

To support the project, Covia team members are conducting soil sampling and site assessments, enabling MJV to develop a custom native-pollinator seed mix. The project may also include a side-by-side comparison of two seeding methods—broadcasting and no-till drilling—to evaluate habitat establishment. Covia will manage site preparation and installation, while MJV provides seed and technical guidance. These efforts will help ensure the habitat is tailored to site conditions and optimized for long-term success.

In addition, the Roff Plant will be participating in the Monarch Watch Tagging Program—a community science initiative launched in 1992 to study monarch butterfly migration. During the fall migration, the team will capture monarchs, record key data including tag code, date, sex, and location, then tag and release them. At the end of the season, this data will be submitted to Monarch Watch to support ongoing research into the monarch’s remarkable fall migration. The team is excited to see how many monarchs they’ll be able to tag this season and contribute to such an impactful project.

Looking Ahead

These projects reflect Covia’s ongoing commitment to environmental stewardship and pollinator conservation. With strategic planning, collaboration, and expert guidance from MJV, these efforts are poised to create thriving habitats that support pollinators and enrich local ecosystems.

Learn more about Covia’s Environmental Stewardship here.

Covia

Covia

At Covia, we are committed to being more than just a leading provider of high-performance mineral and material solutions – we believe that our company can make a positive difference in the world. This belief is what drives our environmental, social and governance (ESG) strategy, which is influenced by both our journey as an organization and the events in the world around us.

Our commitment to operating as a responsible corporate citizen has been embedded into every aspect of our business for decades and serves as the foundation for Covia’s ESG initiatives. From our operations to our Team Members and the communities in which we live and work, we continue to define WHAT WE’RE MADE OF as more than the materials we produce, but the impact we can make in every interaction.

In 2021, we enhanced our approach toward accelerating ESG performance by developing our formal GOALS THAT INSPIRE: ESG 2030. These 10 goals, broken into our three core areas - Environmental Stewardship, Positive Social Impact and Responsible Governance & Ethics - were developed by Covia Team members across the company and are designed to drive tangible and measurable progress in areas where we can make the most impact.

We have the commitment and strategy in place to drive meaningful progress and we are pledging to make a positive differences for our people, our planet and our communities.

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