infrahub.africa

Background

#FreetownTheTreeTown is a portfolio of community urban reforestation projects implemented in partnership with a network of community-based organizations (CBOs), where city residents are paid to plant, nurture, digitally track and monitor trees and mangroves throughout the city. It involves a set of core operations: 1) a member of the community plants and photographs a particular tree, logging it into the Freetown Tree tracker app and uploading information about each tree to the Freetown Green Infrastructure Investment Platform for verification; 2) every three months (or four digital tree trackings per year), information about the trees is logged and verified in the Freetown Green Infrastructure Investment Platform; 3) community growers are paid for their contribution; 4) a ‘token’ is attached to each tree to enable Freetown to create a market for reforestation to fund the trees’ growth and support further reforestation as well as finance adaptation projects in the Climate Action Plan; and 5) the tree is placed on a public map/geotagged so its survival can be monitored digitally.

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Approach

The FreetownTheTreetown campaign employs residents to plant trees and mangroves, and monitor their growth through a digital app. Residents are actively involved indecision-making, taking care of the planted trees, collecting data, raising awareness and maximising economic benefits for communities. One of the main benefits of this approach to reforestation is that the trees are maintained and watered to ensure that they grow to maturity. The "FreetowntheTreetown" initiative offers a more effective approach by directly linking tree planting to financial incentives through its "pay-to-grow" scheme, ensuring ongoing funding for nature-based solutions. Unlike traditional approaches that rely on short-term grants or external aid, this model generates sustainable, long-term resources by integrating voluntary carbon markets and carbon offsets, making it financially self-sustaining. This allows for the large-scale reforestation efforts necessary to address deforestation-related disasters, such as flooding and landslides, while also building climate resilience in a way that conventional methods often fail to achieve.

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Environmental Impact

The #FreetownTheTreetown campaign effectively addresses environmental challenges by strategically planting trees in areas susceptible to landslides, flash flooding, and coastal erosion, thereby mitigating these risks. Unlike conventional tree-planting efforts that often overlook specific environmental vulnerabilities, this initiative focuses on critical zones for reforestation, enhancing water security, reducing heat stress, and improving air quality. In addition to sequestering carbon dioxide, the trees also play a crucial role in regulating heat and humidity, making urban climates more comfortable and reducing the demand for air-conditioning. According to an integrated cost-benefit analysis, the project area has the potential to sequester 500,000 tonnes of CO2, highlighting its substantial contribution to climate change mitigation.

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Success Factors

The #FreetownTheTreeTown campaign has restored 1500 hectares of urban forest and has created over 3000 green jobs for youth and women. Its network of Community Climate Action Ambassadors that are supporting communities to revalue nature and change behavior. This demonstrates how urban reforestation can leverage technology and community involvement in highly effective ways. It not only showcases the potential for extensive implementation within the city itself - with an ambitious goal of tripling the number of trees planted within the next 30 years - but also offers a blueprint for scalability in Sierra Leone and other countries. The success of this nature-based approach can be attributed to various factors, including robust community engagement, innovative technology utilization, stakeholder involvement, and impactful campaign messaging and green job creation for youth and women. The #TreeTown achievements highlight the crucial role of community participation and support, as well as the strategic application of cutting-edge technologies, in fostering sustainable urban ecosystems. By actively involving citizens in the reforestation process, particularly in ensuring maintenance and protection of trees and natural ecosystems, the project has generated a sense of ownership and responsibility, further enhancing the long-term success and impact of the initiative.

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Evidence

The tree growing cycle in Freetown is over a 3 to 5-year period; hence, the #TreeTown approach operates over 3 overlapping 3 to 5-year periods beginning in 2020 when the first 250,000 trees were planted and the initial resources were mobilised and leveraged. Hence, the implementation period based on restoring 5 million trees to establishment through our community growing model takes us to 2030 - an approximately 10-year implementation and funding cycle, where the self-financing component is critical to sustainability. In the first two years since its launch in January 2020, 560,000 trees were planted, digitally tracked ‘tokenised’, and verified on the Freetown Green Infrastructure Investment platform which indicates a tree survival rate of over 80%. Within the #FreetownTheTreeTown portfolio these trees were funded under the World Bank/GEF funded Resilient Urban Sierra Leone Project (RUSLP). RUSLP support has been essential to the#TreeTown approach. Approximately 500,000 trees are verified on the platform and available for investor and public view.

Evolution

Plans have been developed for the planting of 5 million trees by 2030, and a further 15 to 20 million trees by 2050 using the #FreeTownTheTreeTown model.

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Challenges

Freetown’s greatest challenge is the increasing rate of deforestation in and around the forest area (Western Area Peninsula National Park) that extends across Freetown into the Western Area Peninsula, directly linked to unplanned and growing rates of urbanisation that drives increased house building and charcoal burning (for cooking). This threatens natural ecosystems and exacerbates risks of landslides, flooding, coastal erosion and biodiversity loss, while causing water shortages which threaten the survival of trees planted under the project.

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