Conservation organisation Trees That Count has launched a community marketplace to connect native tree planters with funders throughout New Zealand and help the country combat the threat of frequent and more extreme weather events brought about by climate change.

According to Trees That Count, the technology helping increase native tree planting will make a difference to conservation in New Zealand. The idea is that it will allow funders to compete on a Tree Leaderboard, have their funding matched to a planting group, and then see their trees mapped once planted.

“We do this so we can measure the collective impact of the native planting across New Zealand as a strategy for climate change reduction,” Trees That Count project director Tanya Hart said.  “We know businesses and individuals in New Zealand are keen to act on climate change, and planting native trees is such an easy way to do that.”

In return, the technology will also support thousands of planters who can increase native tree planting efforts in their communities.

“To make a meaningful contribution to the New Zealand environment and climate change, we need to plant hundreds of millions of trees over the coming years,” Hart added. “The government’s Billion Trees Programme will support this lofty goal. But government alone can’t achieve this - we need to make New Zealanders understand that protecting our environment is a job for us all.”

There are more than 40,000 trees available to planters already, funded by Z Energy, The Tindall Foundation, Kiwibank, the Department of Conservation and other small businesses and individual donors, the group said.