THE TREES

Campaign Tree Rights

We invite you to listen to the presentation video for our Campaign "The Rights of Trees" by Isabel Verdaguer



Defend tree rights:


This campaign wants to show the trees as the living and sensitive beings they are. Its objective is to show you another different side of the plant world away from the utilitarian vision.

We wants to be closer from plants and trees. To know from them, to defend them in the best possible way.

We want to ensure that they have a legal status and that they can acquire a legal personality. We wonder why a company can have it and a tree cannot?.

We wants to give trees the rights that every living being needs to be able to live in dignity.

We do not want trees to die, but we do not want them to survive either. We want them to live.

They must stop dying because of our whims, interests or our ignorance.

We believe that the proximity factor is fundamental and this is why we want to start first with the closest trees, the rights of urban trees. They are the most disadvantaged and those whisc are the closest. If we are not able to understand, protect and care for our street trees, how can we to protect a forest, or a tropical forests? If we are not able to look after our trees, how can we protect the animals living in them?

So let's start with the little and closest , and then we're going to expand.

We invite you to see and listen to this video we've made (drawn by the Fish Melon of Sarai Aleman Calatayud and written and explained by Isabel Verdaguer) on the urban trees


Priorities


One of our priorities is to prevent daily mistreatment of our trees. Every day, with our little everyday acts and in many cases unconscious, we are mistreating the green around us. Urban trees are continually and widely ignored, beaten, damaged and not even noticed. Many trees die ill each year because of the drastic pruning we are practicing on them. We must put an end to the belief that pruning is beneficial to trees.


Reference and contributor


Francis Hallé, a great botanist of our times, who has dedicated his life to plants and has become a reference in the struggle and conservation of the plant world.

We are in contact with him and we use his books and his work as the working material of our campaign.

We have joined their cause and brought their struggle and work to our country, adapting it to the situation and needs of our trees.

We encourage you to read his book: "The good use of trees", 2011

We will work on a document that will talk about the precarious situation of urban trees and we will make a letter about their rights and send a letter to as many as possible town halls reporting on the need for a change in the urban management of road trees. We also want to propose a change to the current legislation so that plants can acquire a new legal status and can thus have support and legal protection.

Campaign objectives


  • Achieve a law, first at the Spanish State level, and then at European level, which guarantees the rights of trees, which enables them to denounce their ill-treatment and ensure their well-being.
  • Divulge and raise awareness of trees, understanding trees as the umbrella of the rest of the planet living beings.
  • Approach and connect people to trees and Nature in a different way. Emotions as a conservation tool.

Project Pillars:


In order to achieve our three objectives, we split the project into two basic pillars (Legislative Pillar and Educational, Outreach, Awareness and Connection Pillar), within which different lines of work will be opened up which will allow us to make progress on our project.


A) Legislative pillar:


Notebook where we expose the laws that we proclaim for trees and the reasons why we demand them, based on how necessary they are for our human condition and our survival and on their ability to be sentient beings with their own intelligence..


What trees give to us and because they have to be defended. Their rights are our rights.


Here we have an overview of what the trees provide us. It is the most direct way of understanding our proclamation of tree rights, not being a simple whim, but a human necessity. If we want to continue to enjoy our right to life, we must understand that this will only be possible if we defend who gives us life. Defending trees is defending them, but it is also defending ourselves. The proclamation of their rights comes as a result of the large number of human rights that are being violated by not guaranteeing the survival and well-being of trees.

Just as we often fail to realise, or do not appreciate, the great altruistic effort that all the parents of the world make to protect and help their children, we are also unaware of the great service that our allies the trees are giving us.

They also give us food without asking for anything in return, they feed us, they give us a home, thermal regulation, shadow, humidity, water causing rain and fogs, hold back or delay climate change, they hold up the soil, and they prevent the impoverishment of our land by feeding with their leaves and fixing the soil with their roots, they give shelter to mammals, insects and birds that regulate our pests, they make life possible in our cities, they decorate our streets and gardens, they listen to us when we need a discreet confessor, and the most important thing is that they clean up the air we need to breath and that we pollute, theu fix CO2 and other toxic substances in their tissues and in return they give us the pure air that we need to breathe. They oxidize in exchange for carbon dioxide. We have so far been unable to make any machines that can make this exchange for us. Our best technology hasn't been able to improve plants.

What do we need more to see that trees are the best and only way to save ourselves?

We could also list the large number of products and elements that we get from trees, construction materials, food, pharmaceuticals, textiles ....

And the funny thing is that we never talk about the most important value. Its intrinsic value. The value for being what it is and for existing. The value of being a tree.....

Francis Hallé in his book "The Good Use of Trees describes the activity of any person during half a day. Only with the description of noon he makes us see how, without realizing it, practically everything we do needs the existence of trees. I recommend reading it. (Du bon usage des arbres. Francis Halle. 2011)..


Summary of what trees provide to us:


  1. Ornamental value
  2. They extract moisture from floors and walls of houses built on damp soils, mainly from floors built underground.
  3. They reduce and attenuate the noise of cities and roads..
  4. Emission of volatile substances beneficial to control pests, bacteria...
  5. Emission of volatile substances that are beneficial to our health.
  6. Beneficial effects on our body, mind and our emotions. Its presence, and not only due to its volatile substances, have benefits in the mood and psychology of people. Reduces aggressiveness, improves concentration, improves sleep, increases our creativity, increases positive energy, shortens the recovery period...
  7. Emission of substances that attract predators that control certain pests.
  8. It is necessary for fauna and flora for our ecosystem. This property increases proportionally with the tree age.
  9. Shadow
  10. Windbreaker
  11. Increase in air humidity and drop in temperature as a result of its evaporation, perspiration and its self-regulation of temperature.
  12. Due to previous point if we have trees near the houses (flats too) an energy reduction and a consequent economic saving are detected (reduction of 20-25% energy).
  13. They give us water through their moisture and the rain they create, through their evaporation and other molecules that they discharge into the atmosphere. (After mass deforestation, we stop rain and the natural water cycle.)
  14. Production of negative ions that are very beneficial to our health and to our animous state.
  15. They feed the soil with their leaves.
  16. They retain the soil by avoiding erosion and soil impoverishment by wind and erosion.
  17. They absorb CO2 (carbon dioxide). Trees are a accumulator of atmospheric contaminants (half the mass of the tree after drying, it is made of carbon extracted from the atmosphere)
  18. In addition to absorbing CO2 they also absorb other contaminants that are mixed with carbon gas, enter through the leaves, dilute with water, and distribute storing in different parts of the tree. These contaminants may be: Heavy metals (lead, cadmium, manganese, ...), contaminants resulting from combustion and industrial activities, gaseous contaminants, oxides of scourge, NO I NO2, sulphur oxide, SO2, CO, ozone, O3...
  19. This absorption capacity of CO2 and other pollutants makes trees the main tool for controlling climate change.
  20. They provide us with a lot of textile, construction, food and medical materials.
  21. Forests are necessary to enable animals to live in them. Deforestation is causing animals to invade urban areas and interact with humans with the consequent risk of disease infection, cohabitation problems...
  22. They provide us with O2. (Oxigen).
  23. summarizing, the health of trees and forest ecosystems is essential for global health, both to purify , air, earth and water, ensure the richness of our planet, ensures the wealth of our soil, stop desertification and assures us the food we need, ensure rain, promote our health. physical and mental and avoid pandemics. In addition ensures consistency with our past. An origin as an arboreal species that has allowed us to reach the current homo sapiens..

After seeing everything trees are bringing to us and understanding how essential they are for our continuity as a species on the planet, we hope that our proclamation of the right of the trees will be fully justified.

We need them, and with this statement it is justified to include aspects within our human rights to ensure their continuity, because we need them to live . But we would like towe want to emphasize that we not only see the need to add new articles to our rights to ensure their care for our use and benefit, but we also see the need to create laws to ensure their own rights, independently of our interests.

There are situations where the defence of their rights through our own rights can be sufficient, but we must not forget that if we do not focus on the trees, in the case of any conflict of interests between human and human rights, human beings will always win basing ourselves on our right to property.

We believe,so, it is very necessary to create laws to kill the property of a natural good. It is necessary to limit ownership and specify what the property does and does not include.

A declaration of rights and obligations must be made by both sides, and to do so must first be raised to the level of legal personality.

We also advocate, as Francis Hallé also says, for the creation of an independent committee of the executive powers, dedicated to monitoring and advising on trees and on how to interact with them. It must be an apolitical committee that is not dependent on 4-year terms. Trees are not governed by our time scale. Trees unlike us could be immortal if not for some external factor, such as lightning or extreme drought or disease. Trees have genes that can make the cycle that an animal makes during all his life, every year from birth to death. Genes are dying, but the difference is that in humans genes are dying over time and are no longer being created or regenerated, and in a tree in the autumn they are dying to be re-created in the following spring, being able to access to a certain immortality. If we add to this the ability of most trees (most modern) to grow in the form of colonies that repeat structures as repetitious clones, we have very long-lived beings. A longevity that surpasses us even as a species. There are centuries-old, millenarian trees, reaching up to trees that are over 43000 years old, such as the species Lomatia, which germinated in the Neanderthal era, before we even existed as a species and still live today.

A kingdom that has managed to overcome so much, don't you think that our laws have to be able to ensure its survival??

Don't you think we have a lot to learn from a species that has managed to live for so long? And above all, don't you think they deserve to have laws that defend them and a committee that watches over their life and survival? And that in turn ensures our survival?


What do we want to achieve with this campaign?:


  • Ensuring a good relationship between humans and trees.
  • Ensuring a good human use of trees.
  • Ensuring the well-being and health of people and trees.

As the philosopher Robert Dumas says, "The tree is the tutor of humanity". According to him, trees are so important to humans that they give us the possibility of behaving like true human beings. To this end, as Francis Halle says, it is making good use of them.

This sentence makes us understand that human rights cannot be separated from trees and that is why we defend one another.


Articles to add to the Declaration of Human Rights:


o considering that without the trees, we cannot exercise our human condition, and that their company is a fundamental human right, no one can be removed from the sight of the trees, nor be deprived of their presence. And for this: Sites inhabited by humans (towns, villages, roads, etc.) must be as much as possible planted with plants and if possible by trees, considering those green-exempted sites as hostile, inviviable and dehuman, or in their broadest meaning, denatured. 

oarbres to trees can be legitimate as long as it is done in accordance with the stipulations as a good use of trees. In the event of suspicion of misuse, the act may be assessed by an expert and specialist committee for this purpose and the verdict will be made by consensus.

 All humans, being equal in front of trees, will not acquire the right to mistreat or destroy trees.

o arbres to trees can be legitimate as long as it is done in accordance with the stipulations as a good use of trees. In the event of suspicion of misuse, the act may be assessed by an expert and specialist committee for this purpose and the verdict will be made by consensus.

o The attitude of our society, encompassing all sectors, entities and powers, in the face of trees will always be governed by understanding and respect for trees.


Articles about defending tree rights:


  1. Trees must have enough room to live.
  2. They need good soil and water. 
  3. They need protection.
  4. We must give them the time they need.
  5. Do not damage them or mistreat them with our prunes.

1. Trees must have enough room to live: 


It is very important to know and take into account:

  • The airspace and root space each species needs and develops in its adult state. We must think that, contrary to what is believed, the roots in many cases are twice as high as the cup. [p]/p]
  • Buildings, structures, lamps, wiring... and underground facilities.
  • Future urbanism projects that can affect trees.

Taking all of this into account will ensure the smooth development of the tree in the future, it will avoid having to grub them up when they start to have certain dimensions and will above all prevent unnecessary and harmful pruning of the tree for lack of space.


2. Give trees a good substrate: 


In addition to giving them the necessary space, they must be provided with a good plantation substrate, providing at the time of the plantation any land that is necessary for them based on the species and the conditions of the site.

The tree will also have to be provided with a irrigation system, which is much needed during its early years.


3. Protection:


Trees that are planted in urban sites that may be damaged by cars (cars, etc.) will be protected by some type of fence that prevents the excessive approach of cars to their trunk.

In addition, compaction issues will also take into account a minimum separation of any heavy machinery. 

The passage of people also compacts the ground, in the face of which it is necessary to give a minimum space around it that cannot be trampled on.

The surface of any tree must have a layer of organic mulching, which is an organic layer of origin that protects it from erosion, drought, and compaction, as well as providing moisture for it. Another highly recommended option is that the trees will be sown around them with a mixture of wild flower seeds and native herbaceous plants to help create a beneficial ecosystem for the tree and insects, as well as adding an aesthetic factor to space.

When works are to be executed in a place where there are trees, they will be protected with appropriate structures to protect and make the trees visible. In addition, people who work in the work will be trained on the protection of plant elements in the site, who will also be notified of the ban on the dumping of any building element to the substrate.


4.Give them the time they need:


Give the trees the time to grow at their pace. We do not plant large trees as a result of an election campaign that wants to win votes, but we always plant young trees that can adapt to the ground, to the underground structures, that can send their roots to where it suits, looking for moisture, food, anchoring in such a way that it can contrast the strength of the winds, or that it can grow in the opposite direction to something that is harmful to them.

This is how we are thinking not about the immediate, but about the future of our streets, parks or cities. If we want spaces with large trees, we start by planting small trees and growing patience.


5. Pruning:


Since it is increasingly being demonstrated that plants feel and perceive their environment and what happens to them in their own bodies, we must change old ways of acting and treating plants. When we can have a tree this note and a whole subsequent strategy begins to try to close all the scars caused by our poda. These scars depending on the age of the tree, the age of the year, the place, the size of the wound and the species of the tree, may or may not be closed. Although, at best, I can close it, it will probably be several years before that, during which time all types of bacteria and fungi can enter it. Poda's wounds even though they eventually healed have been the input of many pathogens that may remain in the arboreal tissue and advance through them even though the wound is already closed.

Poda may end up killing the tree, and in almost no case will it be beneficial, although humans continue to pod the trees year after year thinking that we do them a good. They are only good, or rather less harmful, training pods, when the trees are still very young, the cleaning pods, extracting dry branches, , and let us never forget that the pods make them necessary for us, because the tree already has its own strategies for living, without any need for human intervention. The problem is that once we have already intervened, and drastically, as when we do the drastic cuts, the tree is completely decompensed and weakened and grows on rotten tissue that makes it a potentially dangerous tree, at which point man must intervene.

And let us not forget that zero risk with a city tree does not exist, just as it does not exist when we cross a busy street, but we do not stop the circulation.

Good management will minimise the risks and dangers of a tree.

Poda is the main cause of death in our urban and garden trees. Frédéric Ségur, the head of the Lyons green spaces in France, provides us with information that confirms this hypothesis: 80% of the diseases of the city trees are caused by the drastic cuts to which they are subjected.

po these prunes will be one of our main demands. It will be an end to their mistreatment.


B) Educational, outreach, awareness and connection pillar:


Make the trees known from every possible angle, and for all ages and sectors of society.

To try to enter regular formations within the forestry field to take lessons on the meaning and communication of plants.


Form to municipalities:


  • About how to treat trees
  • Mark of good living with trees

Trees within the school curriculum:


  • The senses and communication of plants.
  • Drawing Workshops, Art... About Trees

Publications:


  • A book for adults on the tree from many eyes and angles, starting with the tree as a temple and place of spirituality, to a more focus.
  • scientist with new data and research on the different discoveries made about the senses ....
  • Children's stories about trees and nature.
  • Review on Tree

Roaming tree exposure:


  • Talks and Workshops

More vindictive education:


  • Concentrations and demonstrations
  • Work Stops
  • Collection of photographic information, reporting and reporting

Life education:


  • Different activities and workshops to help people connect
  • Tree Plants with schools
  • Forest Baths
  • Dance between trees
  • Conscious walks between trees
  • Arboreo-related drawing and creative art

We fight for the rights of trees.

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