United Nations Environment Programme: Let's plant One Billion more trees in 2008

2008/02/22 15:55

Press Release from:

Mandoga Media

The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) has launched a major worldwide tree planting campaign. Under the Plant for the Planet: Billion Tree Campaign, people, communities, business and industry, civil society organizations and governments are encouraged to enter tree planting pledges online with the objective of planting at least one billion trees worldwide each year.

Achim Steiner, UNEP Executive Director says:
"We have but a short time to avert damaging and economically debilitating climate change. The solutions are numerous and, as many economists say, affordable

United Nations Environment Programme: Let's plant One Billion more trees in 2008

H.S.H. Prince Albert II of Monaco and UNEP Director Mr. Achim Steiner are planting a tree, Photo: Mandoga Media

when compared with the costs of complacency. The goods and services provided by forests are worth billions if not trillions of dollars to the global economy. Forests are natural and economically important ‘sinks’, sequestrating carbon from the atmosphere and locking it away in trunks and branches. Globally, forest cover is at least one-third less than what it once was. It is time to reverse the trends, it is time to act."

HSH Albert II, Sovereign Prince of Monaco adds: "I believe in the symbolic strength of the Plant for the Planet: Billion Tree Campaign and I sincerely hope it will meet our expectations, far beyond the welfare linked to replanting trees, to benefit future generations.”