Freetown, Sierra Leone
“Our target to increase vegetation cover by 50 percent means that we are not only planting trees but growing them. This intervention will enable us to do just that, as the private sector and residents sustain the planting through our tree investment platform.” Mayor Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr OBE
Tackling deforestation
To offset the annual loss of 500,000 trees, Freetown is providing monetary incentives for communities to replant trees in order to establish a tree- trading market that fund additional reforestation. Using geospatial tagging for each new tree, the initiative creates tree tokens in the hopes of developing a new market focused on the reforestation of the city. This initiative offers a unique opportunity to use market forces to drive climate action at the community level.
Photo: Yasmin Metz-Johnson
“My hope is that, through the #FreetownTheTreeTown Campaign, all Freetonians will know that the survival of trees is integral to theirs,” says Valena McEwan, communications lead for the Mayor Development Unit in Freetown.
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