Celebrating 10 years of the Big Trees project
The Big Trees Project is celebrating its 10th birthday this month. In 2010, a group of young people was dismayed by the lack of green space in Bangkok. While the city had advanced exponentially in infrastructure, the growth of public parks and urban flora paled in comparison. It felt stagnant. With a wild dream of creating more healthy green spaces within the concrete capital that would be accessible to anyone, we banded together as the Big Trees Project to work on giving all a quality of life that was not being met by just malls and markets.
There was not much hope for us in the early days. The general public had no clue that our country has too few public parks and green spaces, especially in Bangkok. This meant that we had to first show them so they realised what was missing. The challenge lay in striking a chord with the values of others to initiate discussions. That is never easy.
We learned early on that persuading entire groups was not the way to ignite any project. It was starting small with individuals who had aligned visions that was key. We were lucky to have sympathetic executives in the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration (BMA) and they supported our first big campaign to utilise social media platforms to select 100 big trees in Bangkok. Facebook users sent us photographs of their favourite trees and voted for their place in our campaign list. The winners were then published for the public to see the beauty of Bangkok's trees and this created awareness.
That campaign taught us an approach that we had not thought of. Before, we were shown only two ways that a citizen group could work with government officials -- one was to complain and strong-arm them into yielding, while the other way was to transact with personal favours or benefits. The Big Trees Project sought a third alternative, which is to begin with mutual understanding, cooperation, and striking together only when the time is right. It takes time for our government to work with citizen groups to reach common objectives.
Health and the environment are intricately tied to one another. Soon, we found ourselves organising biking events with the BMA. We held them frequently enough until the idea of organising biking trips became accessible in people's minds and other groups felt like they could easily organise them. We started projects to create good sidewalks for all, including the disabled, at Ratchadamri and Siam Square. For us, biking and walking are activities that build a desire for more trees as citizens spend more time outdoors. However, we never strayed too far from our goal of green space. One project dear to our hearts is helping create 60 parks for the 60-year birthday anniversary of HRH Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn.
It is important to note that we did not come up with these campaigns or projects by ourselves. Most were sparked by our passionate partners. The Big Trees Project, contrary to its name, is not big. We still operate as a small group dedicated to starting and sustaining movements much larger than ourselves. This requires a collective impact and we recognise the importance of working with others to share resources, ideas, and workload. Well-respected leaders and influencers like former prime minister Anand Panyarachun and Ajahn Decha Bunkum, a pioneer on arboriculture in Thailand, have guided us and we have done well by heeding their insightful advice while supporting them.
Aid from Thai corporations allowed us to invest in long-term projects that could take years to get tangible results. Many generous foreign professionals have also made great contributions to us.
International organisations like the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and International Society of Arboriculture (ISA) took great interest in our work and have partnered with us.
Our milestone celebration at the Bangkok Arts and Culture Center from today to Sunday will look to a future with more collaborative projects. Expansion of our network of public, private, and non-profit organisations to work together for a better future will always be a focus in how we work. The Big Trees Project plans to work for the betterment of Thailand for the long haul.
To other ambitious individuals and groups who are driven to help shape Thailand to become a country for all, we would like to cheer them on and encourage them to learn from our past. Meaningful change requires working and sticking together. If the Big Trees Project can do it, other groups with big dreams can do it too. We hope to see them write their own 10-year celebration too.
Santi Opaspakornkij is a coordinator of the Big Trees Project.
Big Trees Project 10 year celebration and Big Tree Festival at Bangkok Arts and Culture Center on December 11-13: https://fb.me/e/cVw5qRcJF
Big Trees Project Website: https://www.bigtreesthai.com
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