The Internet is easily the greatest information resource humanity has ever had at its disposal. Social networking sites like Facebook have brought together old friends like nothing else before it, Google allows us to find anything we need in seconds and Wikipedia has single handily made the encyclopedia obsolete. The Internet is also helping the environment through the many websites that offer to help the environment in exchange for a click, like FreeRice.com, or a credit card payment, like Trees for the Future.

Trees for the Future is a great website that is helping to clean up the air we breathe through their commitment to plant 400 trees for every $40 that is sent to them. My wife and I have already done this as part of Our Green Year, and it is something everyone should do if they have the money.

Since 1989, Trees for the Future has been helping communities around the world plant trees. Through the use of seed distribution, agro-forestry training and programs for developing nations, rural communities are learning to restore tree cover to their lands and how planting trees can help to preserve their traditional livelihoods and culture for generations to come.The trees that they plant initially in communities are multi-purpose and fast growing trees. These trees then lower the daytime temperature, provide shade and add humus and nutrients to the soil, as well as bringing back water to underground aquifers. Since in tropical soils, seeds and roots from the past can lie dormant in the soil for over a century, when the program's trees return the proper conditions into the soil for growth, the indigenous species of trees begin to grow once again and become dominant.

Their programs offers families important and sustainable income-generating activities that help because they contribute to restoring an environmental balance onto the land.

The great thing about the Internet is that it can spread the word about great programs like this. If only 10 people who read this spent $40 a month on trees, it would help to plant 48,000 trees in a year. That is less CO2 in the atmosphere and more clean air for the rest of us to breathe. The future may not be decided by big corporations making hollow promises about going green, it may be decided by internet users who click for the rainforest, test their vocubulary to provide free rice, or buy 400 trees for $40.