A few months back, some of the leading YouTubers such as Mark Rober (ex-NASA engineer) and Jimmy “MrBeast” Donaldson rolled out the TeamTrees program. The program targeted to lift $20 Million, which might let the Arbor Day Foundation to plant 20 Million trees. The aim appeared a little lofty, but the program attained its aim with more than a week to spare before the self-set deadline of December 31, 2020.
YouTubers made videos about trees to market the campaign, resulting in more than 500,000 users to donate to the cause. While a number of donations were almost $5, Elon Musk gave in $1 Million. He even altered his Twitter account to @Treelon to attract for TeamTrees. The Arbor Day Foundation will next month start planting the trees and will have all 20 Million of them planted by 2022.
TeamTrees admits that these 20 Million trees will not stop climate change, but claims that it will act as a hint that users do care about the nature. “It’s time to start working and solutions are all around us. This is just the starting,” claims Campaign Director of TeamTrees, Matt Fitzgerald, to the media in an interview. The success of the campaign is also a hint of how influential stars on YouTube can be and how they can use that clout further than sponsorships.
On a related note, the impact of climate change on oceans is expected to be more widespread than you thought. A research from the IUCN (International Union for Conservation of Nature) showed that climate change and the resulting hotter water lowered the level of oxygen present in oceans by 2% from 1960 to 2010. While that might appear like only a small amount, levels of oxygen in some tropical areas reduced by almost 40%.