Following Pippa's wonderful last blog entry, another personal action you can do is tree planting.  The world's forests are estimated to absorb about About 9 billion tonnes of carbon a year from the atmosphere, but about 2 billion tonnes are returned through burning and deforestation.  In pre-human times, about 80% of New Zealand was forest covered.  Our climate and steep topography make forests perhaps the most sustainable landuse in the long-term.  

As individuals we can plant trees both in our own property and by joining a community planting event such as the regular Arbor Day plantings that are held by Hamilton City or the Department of Conservation.  As planners, we can do what we can to encourage the development of forest-friendly policies.  

A  worthwhile website to visit is http://clickatree.europa.eu/. 

Sometimes it just seems too hard. The atmosphere is warming, sea levels are rising, pests such as the insidious didymo threaten our waters, biodiversity is waning... Our watchdogs tell us that the planet is in crisis, but for many of us response at a personal level may just feel too little too late.

Grace Boyle of the UK-based Independent posts the reflections of Akhila Vijayaraghavan , a campaigner on Sustainable Agriculture  for Greenpeace in India.  (http://community.livejournal.com/rainspotting/2949.html)  Akhila writes of the reactions of people in India to the threat of global warming, “Public perception of this is varied from apathy to mild interest to outright support. The last category forms the smallest percentage – the apathy is most worrying. Consequences of global warming – the biggest battle that humankind faces barely brings a reaction to many people in India – surprisingly even the so-called informed young crowd.”