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Romania: Timisoara's budding tree-watering movement

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October 1, 2025

Volunteers in the Romanian city of Timisoara are using an app to locate and water saplings planted by the local authorities. Their mission: to make caring for urban trees everyone's responsibility.

In a drive to make the city greener, the local authorities in the western Romanian city of Timisoara have planted hundreds of trees in recent years.

However, rising temperatures, budget constraints and staff shortages mean that the trees aren't watered as often as they need to be.

This is where IT specialist Andrei Bora came in: On hot summer evenings, he began watering young trees near his home. Soon, his friends joined in.

Then Andrei and his friend Ionel Marginean developed an app to allow others to do the same.

The location of the saplings is recorded in the app, which also provides information about whether the tree has been watered or not.

And so, the grassroots tree-watering movement known as Green Twin was born.

The movement's goal is simple but powerful: to inspire everyone to care for the trees in their neighborhood.
 

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