The European Union is nowhere near making good on its pledge to plant at least 3 billion trees by the end of the decade, a senior European Commission official said Wednesday.
As part of the European Green Deal, the EU executive committed in 2020 to boosting tree planting in an effort to increase the bloc’s carbon sinks, fight biodiversity loss and mitigate the impacts of climate change.
But four years later, “we are very far from reaching 3 billion trees by 2030,” Commissioner for the Environment Virginijus Sinkevičius told an event organized by the EU executive.
According to an online tool set up by the Commission, only 14.9 million trees have been planted so far. Belgium tops the list with more than 5 million, followed by the Czech Republic with roughly 3 million and France with just over 2 million trees planted.
