In a world where we spend time online to shop for almost anything, stay connected with friends and family and entertain ourselves, can we do more for the environment?
In 2018 Google alone, received over 5 Billion searches each day, with the average person ‘googling’ something 3 to 4 times every day.
These numbers are on the rise each year and could be closer to 8 billion by the end of 2020. What if we could use the power of our searches for something beneficial to us, to communities around the world and to the planet?
Ecosia has a good answer and could be the win, win, win.
N.B: This is an article written entirely from my own research and use of Ecosia. It is not sponsored and does not contain any sponsored adverts or content. This article does contain a link to Ecosia for your own benefit if you chose to follow it. I receive no gain in anyway.
Logo taken from Ecosia’s Wikipedia page.
What is Ecosia?
We use the profit we make from your searches to plant trees where they are needed most. Ecosia.org
Ecosia is a web browser and search search engine like Google, Safari, Yahoo, DuckDuckGo and many others.
The difference is that Ecosia uses 80% of its profits (47.1% of its income according to wikipedia) made from search ad’ revenue to plant trees in 9000 different planting locations around the world.
Every time you search the web you contribute towards the planting of tree somewhere in the world.
Christian Kroll founded Ecosia in 2009 after he travelled around the world and saw, first hand, the impact deforestation was having. He founded Ecosia to combat deforestation and support communities that had been affected. Ecosia is registered as a social company in Germany, which is similar to a social enterprise model in the UK.
Between 2009 and 2011 Ecosia won a range of awards based on its concept and fast growth within Europe and around the world.
In April 2014 Ecosia became the first German B Corporation.
A B Corporation is a business, which must meet high standards in social and environmental performance, maintains transparency to the public and is held legally accountable in profits and its purpose. In a nutshell, a B corporation does well by doing good. By being a B Corp’ Ecosia proves that is more than just hot air and ego when it comes to delivering what it says it does. At the time of writing, I could not find any of the mainstream search engines such as Google, Safari, Bing, and Yahoo etc to be a B corporation listed on B Lab.
By June 2019 Ecosia had hit a planting milestone and had planted 60 Million trees!
In the same year it had also built its own solar energy plant, which provides power to Ecosia to power every search you make.
Where is Ecosia planting trees and how are they helping?
There is a range of examples of where and how Ecosia is helping which you can read here.
Here are a of couple of examples.
Ecosia is supporting coffee farmers in Cauca in Columbia. The region has faced armed conflict for more hat 50 years and since an peace agreement has been made between the government and the gorilla fighters there is now the opportunity to transition in to a peaceful area. Ecosia is supporting local coffee farmers by providing them the opportunity to plant trees and to reforest areas, which helps to get them away from planting illegal Coca plants. This helps the whole region become a more stable and safe place for everyone.
On Sumatra in Indonesia Ecosia is working to restore areas of forest that has been illegally cut. The importance of this work is that it will restore the environment and ecosystem for the wildlife, trees and plants and protect the home of the Orangutan as well as may other important species.
How does it benefit me?
It is very straightforward. If you use the Internet for any reason and you need to search for something, you have a choice. Do you carry on with the search engine you are using, providing ad revenue to make a company rich and add to their profit margins or do you support a company that is open, honest and has a drive to make real change to communities around the world and to the planet?
Simply by being at home on your computer or on the go on your tablet or smart phone you can join one of the 15 million active users of this amazing web browser and be part of the difference.
How do I get Ecosia?
Take a look at https://www.ecosia.org to find out more about the company and their concept and to set Ecosia as your default search engine.
Ecosia is also available as an app from the apple app store and Google play store so you can download and search on the go.
In conclusion.
With so many of us relying on the Internet for so many different reasons and the rate of our online searches increasing year on year we have the power to become a small part of the bigger picture.
Do we continue to line the pockets of companies out to make themselves rich and increase their profits and better their own lives, or do we want to support local communities grow and develop and live better lives?
Do we want to be part of reforestation projects to look after and protect wildlife and ecosystems?
Do we want to be the change all while we continue to do what we do?
Ecosia – the search engine that plants trees. www.ecosia.org