Action for Climate Empowerment (ACE)
What is your demand?
It is a great stressor for children and young people to be expected to solve a crisis they did not create; . It is often heard that the climate crisis is a problem for our youth to sort. The responsibility to finance and implement large-scale climate and ecosystem restoration rests with today’s governments, financial institutions and industries whose activities have contributed most to greenhouse gas emissions. Our project is led by a registered teacher with 45 year’s experience of working with young people, Easy Treesie – Crann Project records children do not simply want to learn about climate change—they want meaningful opportunities to become part of the solution. Since Science Week 2019, schools, families and communities working with Easy Treesie and our partners have planted more than 800,000 trees across Ireland. Young people gain hope through practical action, but our members note that the youngsters are too often expected to carry the burden of repairing the planet alone.
Every child benefits from the opportunity to restore nature before leaving school through activities such as tree planting, biodiversity monitoring, habitat restoration and citizen science according to their abilities. The aim of climate education is empower, not overwhelm.
Children
What is your demand?
Give every child the opportunity to plant and care for trees—but never ask them to carry the responsibility of fixing the climate crisis. Their gift should be hope, curiosity and practical experience. The duty to restore the Earth belongs first to today’s leaders, governments, investors and industries.
Children deserve to inherit a living planet, not the bill and the work of attempting to repair [a dying] one.
Nature and Biodiversity
What is your demand?
Protect existing ecosystems first. Then restore degraded forests, wetlands, rivers, peatlands and urban green spaces using science-based approaches that increase biodiversity, strengthen climate resilience and improve human wellbeing.
The world would gain from treating the minimum restoration targets already agreed internationally as a starting point, not an endpoint. Countries would respond [better] to rewards for developing ambitious long-term restoration programmes suited to their own landscapes and communities. In Ireland alone, Easy Treesie believes there is capacity to restore up to one billion trees across farms, schools, towns, rivers, parks and connected landscapes while supporting productive agriculture and healthy ecosystems.
Restoration success should be measured not simply by the number of trees planted but by long-term survival, biodiversity gains, ecosystem health and community stewardship.
Native species remain the foundation of ecological restoration. At the same time, carefully selected climate-resilient non-native species have an important role in many instances where scientific evidence demonstrates resilience to emerging pests, diseases and future climatic conditions.
Protecting mature trees, hedgerows and existing woodlands is often more valuable than planting new trees and this deserves rewarding.
Food and Agriculture
What is your demand?
Support farmers as partners in ecosystem restoration.
Reward farming practices that improve soil health, restore biodiversity, protect rivers, reduce pollution and integrate trees into agricultural landscapes where appropriate.
Riparian woodland, hedgerows and agroforestry provide multiple benefits including cleaner water, healthier soils, flood mitigation, shade for livestock, carbon storage and improved biodiversity.
Public funding should increasingly reward these public environmental benefits and penalties for those damaging the environment should reflect the seriousness of the harm done.
Adaptation and Resilience
What is your demand?
Healthy ecosystems are essential climate infrastructure.
Nature-based solutions such as forests, wetlands, peatlands and riparian woodlands reduce flood risk, improve water quality, stabilise soils, cool cities and help communities adapt to increasing heat, drought and extreme weather.
Investment in restoration is often more cost-effective over the long term than repeatedly repairing damage after climate-related disasters and of course safer and better for public morale.
Climate Finance and Markets
What is your demand?
Apply the Polluter Pays Principle more consistently.
A greater share of the costs of restoring forests, wetlands, rivers and biodiversity should be borne by those sectors responsible for the greatest greenhouse gas emissions and environmental degradation.
Governments should substantially increase investment in ecosystem restoration because healthy natural systems provide long-term public benefits including carbon storage, biodiversity, cleaner water, improved health and climate resilience.
The environmental costs of armed conflict should also be recognised more fully. Post-conflict recovery should include dedicated funding for restoring damaged ecosystems alongside rebuilding communities and infrastructure.
Mitigation
What is your demand?
Nature already provides proven carbon removal.
Protecting existing forests and restoring degraded ecosystems should be recognised as an essential action; the proposed complement of technological carbon removal is as yet unproven at scale. Investment in emerging technologies should never delay or replace immediate action to restore forests, wetlands and other living systems that already remove carbon from the atmosphere while supporting biodiversity, water quality and human wellbeing.
Sustainably managed production forests also have an important role in supplying renewable timber and reducing dependence on more carbon-intensive building materials. Productive forestry and biodiverse native woodlands are complementary, not competing, objectives.
Governance, Climate Action Plans & NDCs
What is your demand?
Every publicly funded restoration project should be displayed on an open, accessible map so that progress can be monitored, celebrated and supported. Platforms such as Restor demonstrate how restoration can be shared transparently across the world.
Communities should become recognised delivery partners in national [and international] climate and biodiversity plans.
Schools, local authorities, charities, scientists, businesses, indigenous peoples, farmers and volunteers all have essential roles in restoring ecosystems.
Success should be measured by ecosystem health, biodiversity, long-term stewardship and community participation—not simply by the number of projects announced.
Technology and Innovation
What is your demand?
Use technology to support ecosystem restoration.
Digital mapping, satellite monitoring, citizen science and open data can improve restoration outcomes and increase public accountability. Technology should enable more people to participate in protecting and restoring nature.
Other
What is your demand?
Young people are already demonstrating leadership, creativity and determination [in what?]. World leaders must now demonstrate the same courage by investing in practical ecosystem restoration at a scale matching the climate and biodiversity crises.
Nature restoration is not simply about restoring habitats. It is about restoring humanity’s relationship with the living world.
We urge world leaders at COP31 to give children something more valuable than promises: a budget to restore living forests, healthy rivers, thriving biodiversity and hope grounded in action.
#StopTalkingStartPlanting
…with the right trees in the right places.
Supporting references
- Easy Treesie–Crann Project (Ireland)
- UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration (2021–2030)
- Dr Gerhardt Gallagher – One Billion Trees (YouTube)
- Sir David Attenborough – How to Restore Our Forests (Our Planet)
- Restor – global ecosystem restoration mapping platform
Governance, Climate Action Plans & NDCs
Technology and Innovation
What is your demand?
Use technology to support ecosystem restoration.
Digital mapping, satellite monitoring, citizen science and open data can improve restoration outcomes and increase public accountability. Technology should enable more people to participate in protecting and restoring nature.
Other
What is your demand?
Young people are already demonstrating leadership, creativity and determination [in what?]. World leaders must now demonstrate the same courage by investing in practical ecosystem restoration at a scale matching the climate and biodiversity crises.
Nature restoration is not simply about restoring habitats. It is about restoring humanity’s relationship with the living world.
We urge world leaders at COP31 to give children something more valuable than promises: a budget to restore living forests, healthy rivers, thriving biodiversity and hope grounded in action.
#StopTalkingStartPlanting
…with the right trees in the right places.
Easy Treesie 