Coventry City Council aims to plant over 350,000 trees by 2033

Coventry City Council has received almost £400,000 in funding to plant trees in 13 sites across the city. The funding applied for earlier this year will be used to plant 151 semi-mature trees and 7,068 'starter trees' created from seedlings.

A study by the New Economics Foundation found that the Black, Asian, and Minority Ethnic communities (BAME) in Coventry had the lowest exposure to the local natural environment in the West Midlands Combined Authority.

Across Coventry, there are currently around 574,000 trees, 285,000 of which are managed by the council. This is equivalent to 1.5 people per tree and provides coverage of 11.6% of the city, below the regional and national averages of 14.4% and 16%, respectively.

Read more: Investigation into 'unauthorised works' at Coventry's Grade II listed Oak Inn

The council says that planting more trees in the city will help manage the 'extreme temperatures' that are becoming more frequent with climate change. Trees will also help reduce airborne pollution, act as natural flood defences, and remove CO2 from the atmosphere.

The council applied for funding from the Forestry Commission's Local Authority Treescapes Fund (LATF), which will be part of the plans to plant an extra 360,000 trees by 2033. Overall, just over half of the city is a potential plantable area, with almost a fifth of the city being public land that could be planted with trees.

Cabinet Member for City Services, Cllr Patricia Hetherton, said: "This is such fantastic news for Coventry as it will help us to kickstart our ambitious plans to have hundreds of thousands more trees over the next decade, and we can’t wait to get planting.

"The benefits of the Tiny Forests project in our city are plain to see, they increase the general health of the city and its residents, they form part of our climate change strategy, and they provide social value in helping to reduce the inequalities in our communities. We’d like to thank the Forestry Commission for their funding, our partners, and the hundreds of volunteers who have and will continue working with us on this project."

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