Samsung to Plant Millions of Trees to Fight Climate Change

Addressing climate change requires action. Samsung is committed to doing our part to reduce our environmental footprint by embedding sustainability into our business strategies and operations, developing innovative products for a circular economy, and empowering eco-conscious consumers to make a positive impact in their communities. But we know there is still so much more work to do. That’s why we’re broadening our climate strategy by leveraging existing solutions to capture and sequester carbon dioxide (CO₂) from the atmosphere.

Today, Samsung Electronics America is launching a new nature-based project to take actions that support a healthy climate and planet. Our company has set a goal to plant two million trees in Madagascar by the end of the first quarter of 2022. Samsung is partnering with climate solutions platform, veritree, to manage the tree-planting initiative by harnessing blockchain technology to verify and track every step of the reforestation process.

“Samsung’s sustainability journey is an ongoing and multi-faceted one. Investing in tech innovations, such as those that create efficiency improvements and minimize waste, in combination with nature-based solutions, are vital in the fight against climate change,” said Mark Newton, Head of Corporate Sustainability at Samsung Electronics America. “Drawing on our history of open collaboration, we’re teaming up with veritree for the tree-planting initiative as an added way to contribute to a better global society.”

The Ultimate Giving Tree

Trees and forests play a critical role in stabilizing the climate. They impact the carbon cycle, regulate ecosystems, conserve biodiversity, and can help support the well-being and livelihood of local communities. Samsung will work with on-the-ground experts from Eden Reforestation Projects and community members to plant two million mangrove trees near the Mahajanga region of Madagascar, a coastal region faced with biodiversity challenges due to deforestation on an enormous scale. The tropical trees are expected to restore roughly 200 hectares of land and sequester roughly one billion pounds of CO₂ over a 25-year period.

The mangroves that Samsung is planting in Madagascar are some of the world’s most effective nature-based carbon sinks — places where CO₂ 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, have less capacity to absorb and store carbon dioxide 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.

A Verified Tree-planting Approach

veritree utilizes blockchain technology to provide Samsung with a fully integrated platform to support field-level data collection, site planning, inventory (tree) management, and impact monitoring. The system was built to gather data from day one of tree planting and provide greater transparency into the entire process.

“Reforestation is one of the best ways to fight climate change. By collaborating with veritree, eco-conscious brands like Samsung that aim to do good for our planet instead of just less harm can have accurate, ground-level data on their tree planting impact,” said Derrick Emsley, Co-Founder and CEO of veritree. “Our mission is to make it simple to incorporate nature-based solutions into any business model and we’re excited by our strategic partnership with Samsung.”

Creating Meaningful Impact at Every Step

At Samsung, we believe our choices today determine a sustainable tomorrow. In November 2021, we launched an ad campaign, dubbed “Everyday Changes. Meaningful Impact.” The campaign highlights how Samsung has been reimagining our products to build environmental sustainability into everything we do, through innovative product design and packaging, as well as through energy-saving technology and recycling. Working in partnership with our consumers, we can do more together.

Samsung’s sustainability efforts date back to the 1970s when we introduced the Econo TV, which reduced energy consumption by more than 20 percent via an instant reception feature. More recently, we’ve expanded the use of renewable power across all our U.S. facilities, we’ve built an eight-step circular process for our products that focuses on doing more with less, we’ve launched our Galaxy for the Planet platform, and we’re helping consumers take control of their energy consumption with our SmartThings Energy app.

To learn more about Samsung’s climate change efforts, visit our Explore Sustainability hub.