Deputy Minister of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment, Bernice Swarts on Friday, March 28, launched the "One Employee One Tree Initiative" at Environment House in Pretoria.
This aims to have 10 million trees planted by 2030, however, the figure could be even higher, if there is buy-in from all government employees and civil society.
If the programme succeeds, it will mean the South African government would have played its part in improving the quality of the air and mitigating the continuous risk of soil erosion.
In a report released in 2024, Global Forest Watch said there has been a total loss of up to 12% of trees and forests worldwide from 2001 to 2023 due to deforestation which is not being rapidly reversed.
South Africa also experiences challenges of deforestation due to the expansion of informal settlements and developments, people cutting trees for household and industrial use and the burning of forests due to wildfires.
The initiative also sought to relaunch the Revamped National Greening Programme which aims to plant 1 million trees in one day during the month of September which is observed as Arbor month.
Deputy Minister Swarts said: "This initiative will expand beyond the Gauteng province, because it requires a joint effort. We should not limit ourselves to planting one tree each, we should do more.
"Tomorrow morning when you wake up and breathe fresh air, you should reflect back to this initiative. We should build ourselves a great green wall with trees.
"We are going to plant these trees in public spaces, like schools, hospitals, churches and police stations."
The department said in a statement that it will expand this initiative to community-based organisations, businesses and all other government departments and also use the G20 Environment and Climate Sustainability Working Group to get international dignitaries to plant trees during their meetings and the G20 summit to be hosted in South Africa later this year.
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