Forest protection by law? What we can learn from China's "tree duty" – and what we do better.

Imagine you were legally required to plant three to five trees every year. Sounds like a radical idea for climate protection?

In China, this has theoretically been the reality for almost all citizens between 11 and 60 years old since the 1980s. Those who don't pick up a shovel themselves must pay a fee or a fine. However, while state quotas and mass campaigns send a strong signal, the question remains: is this the most efficient way to make our forests climate-resilient in the long term?

The Challenge: Quantity vs. Quality

The Chinese approach aims for sheer quantity to stop desertification. But in practice, it often shows: a planted tree is not yet a protected forest. Without professional care, site analysis, and long-term monitoring, many of these efforts remain only symbols on paper. At greenkeeper, we follow a different path. We do not rely on state coercion, but on economic incentives and technological transparency.

The greenkeeper Approach: Transparency beats duty

Instead of sending every citizen into the forest, we enable companies and private individuals to support professional forestry projects more easily than ever before. Here are the three decisive differences:

1. From "layman's spade" to forestry expert

Instead of having volunteers plant mass seedlings, we finance the work of professionals through the greenfee Token (GFT). In projects like Gut Conow, our professional measures ensure that the forest not only grows but becomes resilient to climate change through targeted underplanting and biodiversity management.

2. Measurability instead of estimation

In China, the implementation of the tree-planting duty is often not consistently verified. With us, the opposite is true: we use satellite monitoring to annually record the actual increase in biomass and CO2 binding. For example, we know exactly that our project in Gut Conow binds an additional approx. 1,300 tons of CO2 (gross) annually.

3. Digital security through blockchain

While state fees often disappear into large pots, our blockchain technology ensures seamless transparency. Every euro invested and every square meter of forest protected is digitally documented and traceably tamper-proof.

Conclusion: The future is voluntary and digital

The Chinese example shows how important awareness of reforestation is. But we believe that modern climate protection in the 21st century must be scalable, voluntary, and above all, measurable. By linking European forestry practice with innovative FinTech regulation (such as MiCAR compliance), we create a solution that not only saves the forest but is also legally secure and attractive for investors and companies. Help us make 300,000 hectares of forest fit for the future – without the threat of a fine, but with real impact.