The Major Tom team may be digital experts, but when it comes to building a sustainable, environmentally responsible world, we still have room to grow. After all, caring for the planet is hard work — and we’re committed to building an approach with real impact.
That’s why, in 2021, we turned to the Arbor Day Foundation to help plant over a thousand new trees — and spare them from our well-intentioned but less-than-stellar style of plant parenting:
It was a good first step. But it was just a start.
So, when deciding how to build a bigger and better sustainability strategy in 2023, we reached out to the experts at veritree.
What does Major Tom’s contribution to veritree look like? You can check it out for yourself.
With their help, we’re currently contributing to the planting of 70 new trees per month — helping sequester 15 tonnes of CO2 monthly. Our first project is also planting Mangrove trees to help fight erosion in the Likoni river delta, where they’ll help to stabilize and protect the landscape.
Our support has just started, but with veritree’s technology, our dashboard will continue to show a live tally of the trees we’ve helped plant and the impact those planters have had on their communities!
Veritree are big believers in making a difference through reforestation. They understand that tree planting done by the right people in the right way can make an impact that goes beyond carbon sequestration. That made them the perfect partners for Major Tom.
There are two main branches of veritree’s work.
First, they connect businesses like ours to tree-planting projects that need funding — and meet certain standards of impact and accountability. Veritree has a whole portfolio of partners, who they’ve hand-picked based on 10 impact criteria:
Basically, veritree understands that new-growth trees can benefit their environment in a whole host of ways. Their partners can help rebuild biodiversity, restore ecosystems, and even provide jobs and other benefits to the communities where they are planting.
The second branch of veritree’s business is their focus on data collection and verification. As devoted followers of the latest news in data-driven marketing, this approach caught our attention.
How does it work? Veritree’s partners upload data and evidence from multiple sources throughout the entire lifespan of their planting projects. Veritree evaluates this data and compares it to established industry standards before publishing it publically to track each project’s impact.
To do that, they use blockchain technology, which powers web3 and opens up some possibilities that we’re pretty excited about. Every tree planted by a veritree partner is registered to their blockchain ledger, providing a permanent, transparent, and traceable record for every single tree planted by those projects.
Veritree also ensures that those trees aren’t abandoned after they’re planted, dedicating 10% of the funding from each project to protect new trees during their first, most vulnerable 3-5 years.
We’re thrilled to watch that impact grow alongside the rest of our sustainability strategy — and to play a part in veritree’s journey to plant 1 billion verified trees by 2030.
Want to follow along on the journey? Watch our dashboard, or stay tuned for more insights into Major Tom’s work on our Mercury blog.