Planting trees for a
healthier planet
To help reduce carbon emissions, Samsung is partnering with veritree to plant 2 million trees in Madagascar.
As Samsung works to reduce its environmental impact, we also want to help the planet begin to restore itself. We’re planting 2 million trees in 2022 to contribute to a better, healthier world. They will help to reduce atmospheric CO₂ levels after society reaches net-zero emissions later this century. And this is just part of our plan to foster a restorative economy that delivers a modern, prosperous lifestyle for all. The race is on to save our species, and we’re all-in.
A more sustainable world
Samsung puts sustainability at the heart of everything we do, making it easier for you to achieve your own climate goals. We’re working to reduce the environmental impact of our manufacturing and packaging, making product use sustainable, and recovering and recycling them to keep materials in circulation for use in the next generation of products.
A few of these changes include the elimination of 92.5% of the plastic used in smartphone packaging compared to 2017,1 lowering standby power consumption in our latest mobile chargers on our way to zero standby energy use by 2025, and increasing the use of recycled materials in new products. At the 2022 Consumer Electronics Show, we announced a partnership with Patagonia to develop a washing machine that filters and captures microplastics that currently escape into our water supply — they’ve been found in fish, animals and even human bodies.
A verified planting approach
One of the ways we’re making everyday changes for meaningful impact is to support planting 2 million mangrove trees in Madagascar, which will be in the ground by the end of March 2022. Just as we’ve collaborated with the world’s most innovative companies, we partnered with veritree, a disruptive reforestation-as-a-service company with a goal of planting more than 1 billion trees, verified by veritree, within the decade. veritree works with planting organizations to implement Samsung technology — including phones and tablets — to collect ground-level data in the field and improve the accuracy of reporting.
Using a Blockchain-based system, veritree tracks each tree for the first five years of growth, then follows the forest’s progress using satellite imagery and local atmospheric conditions to provide an accurate, transparent account of how much CO₂ is captured and stored in the trees.
“Our mission is to align businesses and planting partners, using the power of technology, to rapidly accelerate restoration efforts and combat the climate and nature crises.”
-Derrick Emsley, CEO, veritree
Why mangroves?
The mangroves we’re planting in Madagascar are some of the world’s most effective nature-based carbon sinks — places where carbon is captured and stored, removing it from the atmosphere. Mangrove roots, which are usually covered by water year-round, store CO₂ in the submerged soil along with the trunk and limbs of the tree.
Forests in drier climates, such as those in North America, allow more carbon dioxide to escape than mangroves. It would take between 50 and 100 years to capture the same amount of carbon in a U.S. forest as in the same area populated with mangroves.
Restoring an ecosystem — and a community
In addition to the carbon impact, our project will help a nation struggling with poverty that has driven many residents to contribute to environmental damage to survive. veritree’s employ-to-plant approach provides residents with good jobs, and the restoration of mangroves also brings back fisheries that support even more jobs. In one village where veritree already planted, a population of dozens who struggled to earn a living has grown to almost 2,000 with a diverse economy.
The benefits for nature, however, offer the most important impact: biodiversity. Ninety percent of the species in Madagascar are not found anywhere else on the planet. A variety of lemur species and the flying fox — a fruit bat — for example, are critical to the survival of the entire ecosystem.
Every step counts
Our tree-planting efforts are an investment in the future of our planet — just one small step that can be a catalyst for a restorative economy. While our tree-planting project is focused on Madagascar, the practice of caring for the planet needs to take hold everywhere. We work to make Samsung products that help all of us reduce our environmental impact. We appreciate your choosing Samsung, and together we can choose to restore the planet.
1This represents the change in Samsung packaging from 54% plastic in 2017 to 4% in 2021.
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