The United Nations Environment Programme’s (UNEP) Billion Tree Campaign has set the mammoth target of seeing seven billion trees planted by the end of 2009.
That equates to more than one tree per person alive today.
The new target follows the success of its initial Billion Tree Campaign, which saw more than two billion trees planted in 18 months – double its initial target.
“In 2006 we wondered if a billion tree target was too ambitious; it was not,” said Achim Steiner, UN under-secretary-general and UNEP executive director
“Having exceeded every target that has been set for the campaign, we are now calling on individuals, communities, business and industry, civil society organisations and governments to evolve this initiative onto a new and even higher level by the crucial climate change conference in Copenhagen in late 2009.”
The original campaign was launched at the 2006 UN Climate Change Conference in Nairobi and has seen governments and communities around the world take part, including Turkey, which has planted 35 million trees; India, which planted 10.5 million trees in a single day; and 800,000 schoolchildren in the UK and sub-Saharan Africa who have become involved.
