Our forests have often been called the 'lungs of the planet'. They cleanse the air of particulate and replenish it with oxygen, in the process sequestering carbon as wood. The decline, and in some places devastation, of the old growth forests continue to be one of the large contributors to greenhouse gas emissions... as much as 25% of the problem by some estimates.

But there is an awakening on the horizon as well. Organizations and individuals are organizing around the realization that forests and forest products need to be managed in a sustainable manner if we are to avert the most catastrophic effects of global warming, in the face of civilization's need for those products. Here are links to some of the organizations attempting to make a critical difference.

• The Forest Stewardship Council has a program for the certification of sustainable tree farming operations. On their website you can search for sustainable producers of wood by a variety of criteria including country and species. Here is a good overall description from Wikipedia on the Forest Stewardship Councils origins and activities. Hopefully we will one day soon see their mark on the lumber available to us in hardware and home supply stores.
• The American Forest Resource Council also has climate change and sustainability of the forest products industry in their mission. They have a good discussion of the current climate problems on their website and have an Action Center for engaging people in time sensitive issues, such as legislative initiatives.

If you would like to plant trees, but do not have the land, the time, or the tools and skills to do the job (it's not as simple as plunking a seedling into the ground), you can do so by proxy. There are numerous organizations that will do it for you for a donation of varying amounts. However, when we looked for reputable ones, there were many that seemed to be eco-carpetbaggers. The ones we found that appeared most reputable are in our page Plant a Tree.'