THE United Nations has certified Forest Green Rovers as the worlds first carbon neutral football club.

Rovers earned the recognition after signing up to the UNFCCC Climate Neutral Now initiative for the upcoming season.

The initiative was launched by the UN Climate Change in 2015, and is aimed to encourage and support all levels of society to take climate action to achieve a climate neutral world by mid-century.

Forest Green chairman Dale Vince said: "We're really pleased to do it. It wasn't difficult for us because we've done so much already.

"It's about measuring carbon emissions, reducing what you can and what you can't reduce off set them and we've done the other parts and just did the offsetting part and we're really pleased to do it because it's a great programme and it can bring a lot of organisations around the world into this space and we're the first sports club to have done it.

"It’s a real honour to be named carbon neutral by the UN. We’re a small club with big ambitions and it’s fantastic we can work together to champion the sustainability message worldwide.

"I believe it’s only a matter of time before the big boys like Real Madrid, Man United and the San Francisco 49ers follow our example. I think it's more possible for them than us but the things we do are quite simple, you have to want to do them and they can be done.

We've had conversations with big clubs and people from Wembley have been here a couple of times and they're very keen on pursuing sustainability and that's part of the outcome for us, talking to other clubs, showing them what we do and hoping they embrace it and adopt it.

Miguel Naranjo, UNFCCC programme officer in sustainable development mechanisms added: "From the UN our main goal in dealing with non-state actors meaning anyone who is not national government and to promote additional action, try to facilitate people taking more action and provide recognition for that.

"The UN has limited resources to do that by itself, it has to be done in collaboration with others so Forest Green is an excellent example of an organisation that is doing a lot to address their environmental footprint and serving as an example for others to follow so for us it's very valuable to showcase what they're doing.

"Most of the things that need to be done can be done quite easily, it's just a matter of making the decision to do it and Forest Green are demonstrating that. We’re really glad to have Forest Green on board because it’s an excellent example of the things that you can do right."

Forest Green also launched a new vegan school food range called 'the Little Green Devils' aimed to provide healthy meat alternatives in schools.

Vince commented: "It's launching today, we've been working on it for a few months. We hope to be in schools on the menu from September and the idea is to get school kids fed better, its not for PR purposes or to expand a brand.

"We thought we could take our work in food and football into schools and because it was football related it my have a bit of a resonance with the kids and it might be a great way for them to eat bigger food."