The EU is launching a campaign to plant three billion trees by 2030, nearly as many as there are in Austria's woods.
The forest in Europe should increase. This is a component of the EU's forest policy. Last year, the EU offered a "Green Deal" that included the targeted planting of trees in all 27 member states. By 2030, the goal is to plant "at least three billion extra trees." Afforestation is prohibited, as is the planting of tree species that are not native to the area or in inappropriate locations. In addition, according to an EU description of the project, the ecological standards must be properly observed for a plantation to be included in the program.
"It is part of our efforts to mitigate the consequences of climate change and to halt biodiversity loss," said EU Environment Commissioner Virginijus Sinkeviius during the launch of the "MapMyTree" website.
Increase yearly growth by twofold.
"Three billion is a daunting figure, but collectively we can make this a reality!" he adds. Since 2015, an additional 300 million trees have sprouted yearly in Europe's woods, according to estimates. This number figure will be doubled to reach the three billion thresholds by 2030.
Austria is one of the continent's most wooded countries, accounting for over 48 percent of its total land area. The proportion of forests is by far the largest in Scandinavia; Slovenia, Estonia, and Latvia also have (relatively) much more trees than Germany; and Croatia is rough as wooded as Austria.
In theory, no one is barred from participating in the program; nonetheless, the essential ecological principles established at the outset must be met and verified. Next year, a technique for checking the plants will be devised and made transparently available on a website. May 2020 is the reference date.
1500 forest seedlings per hectare
Almost 90,000 trees have been recorded thus far. France, Greece, the Netherlands, Italy, Spain, and Portugal planted the trees.
What exactly is the magnitude of the figure? Yes, at first glance: there are 3.4 billion trees in Austria's woods. However, upon closer study, the figure isn't all that impressive: 39 percent of the entire territory in the EU is wooded, which equates to about two million square kilometers - over 50 times the total domestic forest area. Over 165 billion trees need to be planted on them.
Planting three billion seedlings would thus increase by less than 2%. Assuming that each country grew the same amount of trees, this meant that in Austria, only 1500 trees were planted on one square kilometer (= 100 hectares) of forest (in addition to the 100,000 standing trees on this area on average). @via europa.eu.
