Global ReLeaf
Global ReLeaf is an educational and action program initiated by American Forests, the oldest national nonprofit conservation organization in the United States, founded in 1875. This initiative focuses on promoting the numerous benefits of trees and forests, emphasizing their role in improving environmental health, supporting biodiversity, and enhancing quality of life for communities. Global ReLeaf sponsors various educational programs that inform the public about the importance of trees in filtering air and water, providing wildlife habitat, absorbing greenhouse gases, and mitigating soil erosion.
The program also undertakes tree-planting projects across the U.S., aiming to restore ecosystems through initiatives like Global ReLeaf Forests. Since its inception in 1988, the program has planted over thirty million trees, with a goal of reaching one hundred million by 2020. Global ReLeaf collaborates with local organizations, governmental agencies, and corporations to facilitate participation from individuals. Through fundraising efforts, including a partnership with a major breakfast cereal brand, the program engages youth in environmental stewardship, exemplified by tree-planting projects in diverse regions, including rainforests in the Philippines and Hawaii. Other organizations globally also share the Global ReLeaf name, continuing the mission of environmental education and conservation.
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Global ReLeaf
Identification: Conservation program that focuses on the planting of trees and the protection of forestlands from overdevelopment and pollution
Date: Initiated on October 12, 1988
Global ReLeaf has successfully planted millions of trees while also working to educate the public about the importance of the world’s forests for the planet’s environmental health.
In the United States, Global ReLeaf is the education and action program of the organization American Forests (formerly known as the American Forestry Association), which was founded in 1875 and is the nation’s oldest national nonprofit conservation organization. Global ReLeaf sponsors educational programs to show the benefits of trees and forests for the environment and for the enhancement of people’s lives. These programs highlight the value of trees for filtering air and water, sheltering and feeding wildlife, absorbing greenhouse gases, and reducing the runoff of polluted soil into rivers and streams. The program also provides funding, from private and corporate donations, for tree-planting projects across the United States.
Global ReLeaf’s activities include ecosystem restoration projects called Global ReLeaf Forests, which involve the planting of trees, typically on public or private land that was once forested but has been cleared by wildfires, hurricanes, tornadoes, insects, or other natural occurrences; by developers; or by unintentional human interference, such as the spread of accidentally introduced exotic species. Program personnel work with local groups to ensure that the new trees are native to the area and that they are properly planted and maintained.
From the time of its initiation in 1988 through 2010, Global ReLeaf planted more than thirty million trees during more than six hundred projects, aiming toward a goal of one hundred million trees planted by 2020. In 2010 alone, the organization planted more than four million trees in fourteen U.S. states and ten countries around the world.
Global ReLeaf has been successful in part because it works with governmental agencies, local organizations, and large corporations to make it easy for individual citizens to participate. Through extensive advertising and publicity, and through a colorful presence on the Internet, American Forests has encouraged donations of as little as ten dollars, with one tree being planted for each dollar received. In partnership with a major breakfast cereal, Global ReLeaf Kids supported a project to plant trees in rain forests in the Philippines and Hawaii.
Other organizations throughout the world have also used the name Global ReLeaf. One prominent group based in Slovakia in Eastern Europe was the former Slovak Union of Nature and Landscape Conservation, now called the Global ReLeaf Foundation. Like American Forests, this organization sponsors educational programs and prepares school curriculum materials, especially about the dangers of pollution and overdevelopment.
Bibliography
Cohen, Shaul E. “American Forests: Planting the Future.” In Planting Nature: Trees and the Manipulation of Environmental Stewardship. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2004.
Gray, Gerald J., Maia J. Enzer, and Jonathan Kusel, eds. Understanding Community-Based Forest Ecosystem Management. Binghamton, N.Y.: Haworth Press, 2001.