Team Trees is a tree-planting initiative to combat climate change started by the YouTube star MrBeast. YouTuber MrBeast, whose real name is Jimmy Donaldson, launched the tree-planting campaign on October 25 to celebrate reaching 20 million subscribers on YouTube.
The idea initially came from one of his fans, who suggested he could celebrate reaching 20 million subscribers by planting 20 million trees.
MrBeast and YouTuber Mark Rober partnered with Arbor Day Foundation to raise the money and get the trees planted. And since MrBeast announced the goal of planting 20 million trees, the YouTube community mobilized to support him.
All the money raised by the Team Trees campaign will go to the Arbor Day Foundation, a U.S.-based non-profit organization that focuses on planting trees to combat climate change.
Arbor Day Foundation will be able to plant a tree for every dollar raised by the Team Trees initiative. They plan to plant trees on every continent except Antarctica.
The Team Trees campaign has raised more than $11 million since MrBeast launched it on October 25.
Donations to Team Trees have come from prominent individuals such as Tesla and SpaceX founder Elon Musk, Shopify CEO Tobi Lutke, YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki, and Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey.
Elon Musk donated $1 million and changed his Twitter handle to “Treelon” to help promote the campaign. Tobi Lutke also donated $1 million and one, and Susan Wojcicki $200,000. Twitter founder and CEO Jack Dorsey donated $350,000.
The CEO of Shopify has claimed his throne! @tobi Thank you so much! ❤️ pic.twitter.com/nZ54uTvb4e
— MrBeast (@MrBeastYT) October 30, 2019
BTW! Elon, is a masculine first name, which means "tree" or "oak tree" in the Hebrew language.
Did you know this @elonmusk ?
Guys go donate at https://t.co/aU4SB5WYWI @MrBeastYT pic.twitter.com/i8cX736bTg
— Team Trees ? (@TheTeamTrees) October 30, 2019
Susan donated $200,000 and filmed a video!!!!!!!! Sorry I was busy the day you filmed, I would have loved to be in it!!! ? :)))))))))) https://t.co/yeYfWZt3ZK
— MrBeast (@MrBeastYT) October 30, 2019
Jack (CEO of twitter) just casually donated another 200,000 trees lol
Go Donate! – https://t.co/TGq0wXQnDY pic.twitter.com/Fyj877dL3U
— MrBeast (@MrBeastYT) October 31, 2019
Other donors include Norwegian DJ Alan Walker, who donated $100,001.
Your EDM Alan Walker Donates Over $100,000 to Team Trees: Alan Walker has joined forces with Team Trees to plant 100,001 trees. At a dollar per tree, he’s dropped over $100,000 for the… https://t.co/6VZj8Bq14i #EDMNews #alanwalker #donation #environment #TeamTrees Via @YourEDM pic.twitter.com/se6CHfBejm
— Bradley Jon Eaglefeather (@bjeaglefeather) October 26, 2019
MrBeast donated $200,002 to his initiative.
Top 10 tree? planters until now?
1.@ElonMusk 1,000,000
2.@YouTube 1,000,000
3.@MrBeastYT 200,002
4.@IAmAlanWalker 100,001
5.#Ukraine 50,001
6.@MarkRober 50,000
7.@JeffreeStar 50,000
8.@theodd1sout 33,333
9.@JaidenAnimation 20,000
10.@LachlanYT 15,000#TeamTrees #ClimateAction pic.twitter.com/wlfx3uGxoN— Enje Jawher (@EnjeJawher) October 30, 2019
Other YouTube stars who have supported the campaign include PewDiePie and Jeffree Star. PewDiePie donated $69,420.
https://twitter.com/pewdiepie/status/1189902583936225283
Tens of thousands of MrBeast’s fans and other social media users have also donated to the campaign. Arbor Day Foundation spokesperson Danny Cohn told CNN that as of Thursday, October 30, more than 300,000 people had made donations since the Team Trees campaign launched on Friday, October 25.
The tree-planting campaign is meant to combat global warming due to increasing atmospheric levels of greenhouse gases, such as carbon dioxide.
Climate scientists believe that the increase in atmospheric greenhouse gases is due to increasing industrial emissions. According to climate scientists, trees help to reduce greenhouse gases because they absorb carbon dioxide and release oxygen during photosynthetic activity.
Every tree matters! I know I’ve been posting all the big donations but the small ones are just as important! WE WILL HIT 20,000,000! :)) pic.twitter.com/D72cg1qaxn
— MrBeast (@MrBeastYT) October 30, 2019
At the time of writing on October 31, the campaign raised nearly $12 million.
The fundraiser is scheduled to end on January 1, 2020, but after having raised more than $11 million since October 25, the $20 million should be reached long before January 1.
WOW — More than halfway to 20 Million trees by 2020 only 5 days in!!!
While the big donations make a splash, with over .25M donors so far this is a victory for all the $1 and $2 contributions. Keep it up!!! @MrBeastYT #TeamTrees pic.twitter.com/XDAs0JKOlM
— Team Trees ? (@TheTeamTrees) October 31, 2019
You can donate to Team Trees on their website. You can make a cash donation or purchase Team Trees merchandise.