Consumers who plan to buy a Christmas tree this holiday season have a choice between a real tree or an artificial one. It’s a purely personal preference, but researchers, scientists, and industry experts say the decision can have a big impact on the environment and national economy.
Dr. Clint Springer, assistant professor of biology at Saint Joseph’s University in Philadelphia believes that buying a real Christmas tree, hence encouraging Christmas tree farms to stay in business, makes you a much friendlier person to the environment.
“Research has shown that trees slow the rate of greenhouse gas accumulation in our atmosphere,” Springer says. “Christmas tree farms provide a haven for birds to take cover from predators and harsh weather, and they can feed on insects found on trees. The farms also help maintain open, undeveloped space. This type of green space is important because it can serve as a bridge between larger tracts of contiguous forest land for animals, plants, and insects.”According to National Christmas Tree Association (NCTA), there are about 350,000 acres in production for growing Christmas trees in the United States, of which much preserves green space; growers plant one to three seedlings for each tree harvested.
Dr. Springer said real trees are biodegradable and recyclable whereas fake trees are taking increasingly more natural and nonrenewable resources, for example petroleum, to make. “They will end up in a landfill where they will linger in the environment forever, whereas live trees are recycled and made into mulch.”
The arguments make artificial tree manufacturers’ ads “You save a tree by using a fake tree” seem like a greenwash, a term used to describe company’s misleading PR campaign to position its products as being environmentally friendly.
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Buying locally grown trees leaves a much lighter footprint on the environment when you consider the gas, energy, carton boxes (made of real tree) consumed in transporting fake trees all the way from China.
According to the 2009 poll results by Harris Interactive, a market research company, American consumers purchased 28.2 million farm-grown Christmas trees and 11.7 million artificial trees. The study also reported that 31 percent of Americans plan to buy a real tree for the 2010 holiday season compared with 8 percent who said they would buy a fake tree.
But the choice of buying a real or fake tree goes beyond environmental awareness.
“A real tree symbolizes time-honored family traditions and evoke happy memories,” Dr. Springer says.