Is planting trees an effective way to fight climate change?
Yes. It must be included as part of a broader climate change strategy. Estimates are that as much as 50% of the increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide over the last 50 years may be due to the effects of land use change. Thus, restoring forestland represents a natural way to reverse these effects and combat climate change. As trees grow, they absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and store it in living plant tissue. Reforestation of once-forested, but currently degraded and unproductive areas such as marginal agricultural lands is a recognized and proven way to sequester carbon. According to a recent study by the Pew Center on Global Climate Change, climate change policies should include storage of carbon dioxide in forests. “Climate change is the major global environmental challenge of our time and in order to deal with it in the most cost-effective way, we need to consider the full range of solutions – and that includes carbon storage in forests,” said Eileen Claussen, President o
