The Borneo Sevens Tree Planting Programme is about more than planting trees. It is about creating long-term environmental value, strengthening local biodiversity, and leaving a living legacy beyond the tournament.
With 50 trees from 16 species planned for planting, this programme will contribute in four key ways: carbon capture, oxygen production, habitat creation, and long-term ecological restoration.
Carbon capture
Trees remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere through photosynthesis and store that carbon in their wood, roots, leaves and branches. That is why tree planting is widely used as a nature-based climate action tool.
Using a commonly cited mature-tree benchmark, one mature tree can absorb more than 48 pounds of CO₂ per year, which is about 21.8 kg annually. Based on that benchmark, 52 mature trees could absorb roughly 1.1 tonnes of CO₂ per year once established.
It is important to state this carefully in public materials: these are mature-tree estimates, not first-year seedling numbers. In the early years, carbon uptake will be lower and will increase as the trees grow.
Oxygen production
Urban tree research from the U.S. Forest Service shows oxygen production varies significantly by tree size, with example annual outputs ranging from about 45.6 kg O₂/year for smaller trees to 110.3 kg O₂/year for larger trees.
Using that mature-tree range, 52 established trees could eventually produce about 2.4 to 5.7 tonnes of oxygen per year, depending on species, age and canopy size.
Biodiversity and wildlife value
This planting list is especially strong from a biodiversity standpoint because it includes a heavy fig component. Your fact sheet shows that many of the selected Ficus species fruit repeatedly and are important food sources for birds, bats and mammals. Some are specifically noted as being used by hornbills, orangutans, proboscis monkeys, flying foxes, civets, squirrels and other wildlife.
That matters because fig trees are often considered keystone food sources in tropical ecosystems. In practical public-facing terms, this means the programme is not only planting shade trees — it is helping create a feeding network for wildlife.
Native and Bornean ecological value
The species mix also includes local and regionally relevant trees, including Palatupai (Artocarpus brevipedunculatus), which your fact sheet identifies as endemic to Borneo. Other selected species are tied to Borneo, Sumatra, Peninsular Malaysia and wider Southeast Asia, which gives the programme stronger local ecological meaning than a generic ornamental planting exercise.
