Armenia Tree Project

Armenia Tree Project (ATP)

Yerevan headquarter
Formation	1994 (1994)
Founder	Carolyn Mugar
Headquarters	Yerevan, Armenia and Watertown, Massachusetts
Services	Environmental education and advocacy, reforestation, community development
Managing Director	Tom Garabedian
In-Country Director	Lucineh Kassarjian
Deputy Director	Jason Sohigian
Parent organization	Armenian Assembly of America
Staff	80
Website	www.armeniatree.org

Armenia Tree Project (ATP) is a non-profit organization based in Watertown, Massachusetts, United States, and Yerevan, Armenia, founded in 1994 by Carolyn Mugar to promote Armenia's socioeconomic development through reforestation. Since its founding, the organization has planted more than 4.5 million trees in communities throughout Armenia.

The organization has a full-time staff of 80, of whom 75 are employed in Armenia. Its Yerevan branch manages three state-of-the-art tree nurseries, two environmental education centers, and partners with families to create tree-based small business opportunities. Its major program initiatives include planting trees at urban and rural sites, environmental education and advocacy, community development and poverty reduction.

When Carolyn Mugar, from Boston, visited Armenia in 1992, the country had been impoverished by an energy embargo imposed during the Nagorno-Karabakh War. Armenians had previously depended upon natural gas for 90 percent of their energy needs, but their supply had been cut off by the embargo. Deforestation was particularly severe during the early 1990s, because many Armenians had only their trees as a fuel source during the winter. This condition raised a concern about whether land formerly protected by forest cover would become desert. A study in 2005 estimated Armenia's forest cover at 11.2 percent of its total land area, dropping to 8.2 percent by 2000. In 2012, the ATP reported the country's forest cover down to only 7 percent.

In 1994, Carolyn Mugar established the Armenia Tree Project to address the environmental and economic disaster of Armenia's dwindling forests. The ATP was organized as a subsidiary of the Armenian Assembly of America, which continues to provide administrative assistance. Since its founding, the ATP has planted over 4.5 million trees throughout Armenia. As of 2014, the organization was operating three tree nurseries, providing full-time employment for 45 people, and fruit trees planted by its projects were producing an estimated harvest of over 300,000 pounds annually.

The organization's mission emphasizes the use of trees to promote economic self-sufficiency, improving the Armenian standard of living while protecting the environment. Its urban and community tree planting programs work with cities and local neighborhoods to replant in public spaces such as in parks, school grounds and other public properties. In rural areas, farmers grow seedlings in their backyards for tree planting projects in northern Armenia.