Here's some good news:
I think this venture has proven so successful partly because it is
difficult to attack, and has lots of other benefits besides helping
restore the earth's CO2 balance. Perhaps most of the initiatives
which have the best chances of success also posess similar properties:
they are multi-purpose, providing a variety of benefits besides their
primary ones.
http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/may2008/2008-05-14-02.asp
Billion Tree Campaign Flowers Into Seven Billion Tree Campaign
NAIROBI, Kenya, May 14, 2008 (ENS) - The UN's campaign to plant one
billion trees has been so successful that it was expanded Tuesday to
become a Seven Billion Tree Campaign. In just 18 months, the original
Billion Tree Campaign has inspired the planting of two billion trees,
double its original target.
The effort is intended to avert rapid global warming by planting trees
to absorb the main greenhouse gas carbon dioxide. Deforestation
accounts for over 20 percent of the carbon dioxide humans generate.
Trees also keep precious rainwater from running off the land and
shelter wildlife to combat the ongoin loss of biodiversity.
"When the Billion Tree Campaign was launched at the Climate Convention
meeting in Nairobi in 2006, no one could have imagined it could have
flowered so fast and so far. But it has given expression to the
frustrations but also the hopes of millions of people around the
world," said Achim Steiner, head of the UN Environment Programme,
which spearheaded the Billion Tree Campaign with the World
Agroforestry Centre.
"In 2006 we wondered if a billion tree target was too ambitious; it
was not," Steiner said. "The goal of two billion trees has also proven
to be an underestimate. The goal of planting seven billion trees -
equivalent to just over a tree per person alive on the planet - must
therefore also be do-able given the campaign's extraordinary track
record and the self-evident worldwide support."
To date the initiative, which is under the patronage of Nobel Peace
Prize Laureate and Kenyan Green Belt Movement founder Professor
Wangari Maathai and Prince Albert II of Monaco, has broken every
target set and has catalyzed tree planting in 155 countries.
Heads of state including the presidents of Indonesia, the Maldives,
Mexico, Turkey and Turkmenistan as well as businesses; cities; faith,
youth and community groups have planted trees as part of the campaign.
Individuals have accounted for over half of all participants.
The Ethiopian Millennium and the International Day of the African
Child, Bole High School students celebrated the day by planting 150
trees. The Ethiopian Minister for Agriculture, representatives from
UNICEF, UNEP and the European Union attended the event. (Photo
courtesy UNEP)
Geographically, Africa is the leading region with over half of all the
two billion trees planted. Regional and national governments organized
the most massive plantings, with Ethiopia leading the count at 700
million, followed by Turkey at 400 million, Mexico at 250 million, and
Kenya at 100 million trees planted.
To protect vulnerable shorelines, mangrove plantings were organized by
Planète Urgence in Banda Aceh and other Indonesian provinces
recovering from the December 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami.
In the United States, the Replant New Orleans initiative sponsored a
planting of fruit trees to rejuvenate the community struggling with
the effects of the 2005 Hurricane Katrina.
In a single day in the state of Uttar Pradesh, India, 10.5 million
trees were planted.
The two billionth tree was put into the ground as part of an
agroforestry project carried out by the UN's World Food Programme,
WFP. As part of this campaign, the world's largest food aid
distribution agency has now planted 60 million trees in 35 countries
to improve food security in the midst of a global food crisis.
In announcing the agency's contribution to the Billion Tree Campaign,
WFP Executive Director Josette Sheeran said, "WFP is concerned about
rising costs of food and fuel which inevitably hit the bottom billion
hardest. More people will require WFP assistance at a time when WFP's
current programmes are reaching fewer due to the critical funding gap
created by rising costs."
WFP has planted half the trees in Syria, Sheeran told the European
Parliament Development Committee in December. "The eucalyptus trees
are actually putting back water into the ground now after six years,"
she said. "This kind of practical effect to protect food supply
systems is very important. In fact, WFP has planted over five billion
trees in the world in the past 30 years to protect delicate food
ecosystems after a disaster or after a war."
The tree-planting campaign has attracted the support of multilateral
organizations including the Convention on Biological Diversity whose
new Green Wave initiative was launched in advance of its conference
being held in Bonn, Germany later this month.
"The Billion Tree Campaign has not only helped to mobilize millions of
people to respond to the challenges of climate change, it has also
opened the door, especially for the rural poor, to benefit from the
valuable products and services the trees provide," said Dennis
Garrity, director general of the World Agroforestry Centre.
"Smallholder farmers could also benefit from the rapidly growing
global carbon market by planting and nurturing trees," Garrity suggested.
Schoolgirls in Bahrain plant trees as part of the Billion Tree
Campaign. (Photo courtesy UNEP)
Tree planting remains one of the most cost-effective ways to address
climate change. Trees and forests play a vital role in regulating the
climate since they absorb carbon dioxide - containing an estimated 50%
more carbon than the atmosphere. rivaling the emissions from other
sources.
Trees also play a crucial role in providing a range of products and
services to rural and urban populations, including food, timber,
fiber, medicines and energy as well as soil fertility, water and
biodiversity conservation.
The campaign has also generated significant appeal in post-conflict
and post-disaster environments. In acting upon the words of the
campaign's patron Wangari Maathai "when we plant trees, we plant the
seeds of peace and seeds of hope," communities in Afghanistan,
Bosnia-Herzegovina, Iraq, Liberia and Somalia contributed to the
global effort with over two million trees.
The private sector pitched in as well, accounting for almost six
percent of all trees planted. Multinational corporations including
Bayer, Toyota, Yves Rocher, Accor Group of Hotels and Tesco Lotus
supported the campaign, as did hundreds of medium and small-sized
enterprises the world over.
"The Billion Tree Campaign is UNEP's call to the nearly seven billion
people sharing our planet today to take simple, positive steps to
protect our climate," said Steiner. "It is a defining issue of our era
that can only be tackled through individual and collective action. I
am convinced that the new target will be met - one tree at a time."
The Billion Tree Campaign website is at:
www.unep.org/billiontreecampaign and at:
www.worldagroforestry.org/billiontreecampaign/
posted to ClimateConcern by Ross Mayhew
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