‘Trump Forest’ campaign aims to compensate for the impact of President Trump’s climate policies

An online international campaign that was launched in New Zealand aims to plant 100 billion trees all around the world, having calculated the carbon offset of Donald Trump’s anti-climate policies. 

An online international campaign that was launched in New Zealand aims to plant 100 billion trees all around the world, having calculated the carbon offset of Donald Trump’s anti-climate policies.

The campaign has been founded “as a global collective effort to motivate and inspire people to grow trees in the fight against climate ignorance promoted by President Donald Trump” according to their founders.

Climate Scientist Adrien Taylor, 27, Dr. Daniel Price, 29, and PhD candidate Jeff Willis, 28, got inspired to launch the initiative, after they were ‘surprised’ by President Trump’s rhetoric on climate change and his ‘ignorance’, some weeks before the President announced the withdrawal of the US  from the Paris Agreement.

In an interview in IFLScience, Andrien Taylor said: “It was really quite demoralising to have someone who questions basic science elected president of the free world”.

"We've met some of the people on the front lines of climate change in Bangladesh, Mongolia and in other countries, and we found it extremely upsetting that Mr Trump's ignorance is so profound".

"So we started to do something about it. Only a small percentage of the world voted him in, but we all have to deal with the consequences of his climate ignorance".

The idea behind Trump Forest is that in order for the world to compensate for Trump’s policies, which are estimated to 650 megatonnes of CO2, the planet needs 100 billion trees for carbon offsetting.

"We want to plant a global forest that will offset all of the emissions that the Trump administration puts in the atmosphere. It sounds a bit ridiculous but it is completely feasible," said Dr Daniel Price expressing the team’s optimism that the goal will be achieved.

During the first month, 15,000 trees were pledged and by the beginning of August the number had increased in 120,000 from 450 people around the world.

Now, the pledges have reached 390,612 from 1,324 people.

“We know Trump likes his things, he’s got Trump Vodka, Trump Chocolate, Trump Towers. So we thought he might like Trump Forest too”, Taylor commented regarding the name of the campaign.  

"We kind of want him to love the forest; this is his forest after all. We would love it if he tweeted about it”.

Despite the campaign having received much support internationally, with pledges from all around the world, the founders have revealed that they have received a ‘bit of hate mail too’ from people supporting Trump’s policies.

Check out how the campaign works, and Make Earth Great Again here!