evidoria

← Back to browse

Good practice Imported

Freetown the Treetown — Pay-per-Verified-Tree Urban Reforestation

Sierra Leone · Freetown · See the Sierra Leone profile · See the Freetown profile

Evidence: Descriptive / self-reported Top 64% 40/100 · Ask Evidence Copilot about this practice

Freetown City Council pays community growers, mostly women and young people, per digitally verified surviving tree via a GPS/photo-audited app; about 500,000 trees were verified toward the 2024 one-million target, with survival above 80%.

500,000 trees
Trees verified on public platform (mid-2020s)
above 80 %
Reported tree survival rate (mid-2020s)
1 million by 2024; 5 million by 2030 trees
Target trees planted (2020-2030)
Freetown the Treetown — Pay-per-Verified-Tree Urban Reforestation

Details

Maturity
Scaling
Promoter
Freetown City Council
Period
2020–present (target: 5M trees by 2030)
Keywords
urban forestry, climate resilience, digital MRV, municipal government

Context

Freetown lost roughly 70% of its tree cover to unplanned urban growth, contributing to the 2017 landslide and floods that killed an estimated 1,000 people.

Objectives

In 2020 Mayor Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr launched 'Freetown the Treetown' as part of the Transform Freetown agenda and the Freetown Green Infrastructure investment plan, targeting one million trees by 2024 and five million by 2030.

Activities

Community growers, predominantly women and young people, plant and tend saplings, tagging each tree's GPS location and photographing it periodically on the TreeTracker digital platform. City data technicians digitally verify each tree and conduct monthly physical audits; growers are then paid quarterly in tokens redeemable for cash, funded through the Freetown Green Infrastructure Investment Platform and carbon-market sales -- a 'pay-to-grow' model tying payment to verified survival rather than planting alone.

Results

By the mid-2020s roughly 500,000 trees were verified on the public platform, with a reported survival rate above 80%. The programme won 2021 Bloomberg Philanthropies Global Mayors Challenge funding, was a 2023 Earthshot Prize finalist, and in 2025 UNDP highlighted it as a reforestation-finance model being scaled toward 5 million trees by 2028-2030.

Conclusions

Independent, standards-based carbon certification is not documented for the token/carbon-market funding stream, and headline figures come mainly from the city's own platform rather than third-party audits, so carbon and biodiversity gains should be read as city-reported rather than externally certified.

Implementation
Indicative cost
High (€500k–€5M) — No total cumulative programme budget is stated; funded via the Freetown Green Infrastructure Investment Platform, carbon-market sales and a Bloomberg Philanthropies Global Mayors Challenge grant (grants of this type are typically ~US$1 million). Conservatively estimated as 'high', noted as inferred, not stated.
Time to results
Long (> 3 years) — Launched 2020, targeting 2030 (>3 years elapsed and ongoing).
Staffing & skills
Community growers (predominantly women and young people), City data technicians (digital verification and monthly physical audits)

Conditions for success

  • Digital MRV (GPS-tagged photos on TreeTracker) ties payment to verified survival rather than planting alone
  • Quarterly token payments redeemable for cash give growers a steady income stream
  • High-profile political backing (mayoral leadership, C40 network, Bloomberg/Earthshot recognition) sustained funding attention

Common failure modes

  • No independent, standards-based carbon certification (e.g. Verra, Gold Standard) documented for the funding stream
  • Headline figures come from the city's own platform rather than third-party audit

Where it fits

Governance type
municipal government (city council)
Scale
city-wide, targeting millions of trees
Income level
low-income

Commonly funded by

Philanthropic / foundation funding

Indicative funding routes for practices of this type — always check each programme's current calls and eligibility rules.

Do you run this practice? Claim it — verified implementers get a public contact pathway and can propose corrections.

Data sources

Where this practice's information was retrieved from, and when.

Attachments

Similar practices you may find useful