Some 60% of Taiwan is covered with forest, and the island, which straddles the Tropic of Cancer, has both tropical and temperate climatic conditions. Moreover its mountains reach heights of nearly 4,000 meters above sea level, creating extensive forest vistas. In 1912 the British botanist William Robert Price (1886–1975) came to Taiwan and was amazed at the magnificence of the cypress forest on Alishan.

In the era of Japanese colonial rule (1895–1945), large-scale logging began of camphor trees and of the precious cypress trees growing high in the mountains. After the Republic of China took over governance of Taiwan the forestry industry continued to develop, earning a great deal of foreign currency for the island. However, in view of the depletion of forest resources and other environmental harms associated with logging, in 1989 the government announced a ban on felling trees in grade one natural forest (natural forest with high-value tree species), and in 1991 it extended this protection to all natural forest, finally giving Taiwan’s verdant mountain woodlands a chance to recover.

In 2018 the Forestry Bureau launched the Taiwan Ecological Network (TEN) initiative, linking together fragmented habitats through ecological corridors stretching from the plains to the highest mountain peak at 3,952 meters. TEN is a move in the direction of sustainable development with ecological conservation. The Forestry Bureau is also executing a program for cooperation with indigenous communities to jointly manage mountain forests, and as of late 2022, 33 mountain villages had been selected to promote “sustainable economies that are mutually beneficial for people and forests,” with the bureau’s forest district offices assisting indigenous communities in developing forest-friendly economic activities. Meanwhile the private sector is joining the effort to nurture forest resources by adopting ­areas of forest or buying forest land and placing it in trust.

At present, Saisiyat indigenous communities in Miaoli County’s Nanzhuang Township are cooperating with the Forestry Bureau to manage the mountain forests there. They are working with the local forest district office to develop business activities including beekeeping, growing shiitake mushrooms on logs, and ecotourism. These activities are all in keeping with the principles of the Satoyama Initiative, and embody the spirit of people-­centered collaborative mutual prosperity.

Wang Chih-chiang, a professor in the Department of Forestry at National Pingtung University of Science and Technology, says that for areas where primeval forest was previously logged and that are unsuited to economic development, ecological conservation is the top priority, and only by planting tree species suited to each specific locality can the forest’s capacity for soil and water conservation and maintaining biodiversity be restored.

Forty years ago, Sula Sukinadrimi and his father Legeay Sukinadrimi of the Rukai community of Kabalelradhane in Pingtung’s Wutai Township began mobilizing their family to restore 100 hectares of mountain forest in Wutai. They have planted more than 10,000 trees of native Taiwanese species, including zelkova (Zelkova serrata), Japanese blue oak (Cyclobalanopsis glauca) and Formosan sweetgum (Liquidambar formosana). In 2018, Sula was recognized by the Forestry Bureau for his achievements in forestry and nature conservation.

Across the valley from Dresedrese Pacengelaw’s breakfast shop lie the Damumu Mountains, where the forest land being restored by Sula Sukinadrimi and his father Legeay is located.

The man who plants trees

When we arrive at a breakfast shop in Kabalelradhane, Sula’s wife, Dresedrese Pacengelaw, is washing dishes, while his mother, Devadeva Palrangelrange, is wiping down the tables. Sula himself comes forward to greet us and leads us to sit down at a table near the door to the kitchen.

Speaking of the emotional connection between the mountains and the people of his community, he says: “We have lived here for thousands of years, coexisting with the mountain forests.” Without the mountains there would be no water, no woodland, no wildlife, and no people. His outlook is simple: everything is linked. “You ask me why I plant trees; all I can say is that it’s a very natural thing to do.”

“When logging was underway, the land was injured and the trees disappeared. The way for humans to heal the land is to plant trees.” Now aged 57, Sula first went with his father Legeay into the Damumu Mountains when he was 12. He steadily grew familiar with the mountain forests, including the locations of different areas of woodland, the directions of flow of the rivers, and methods of hunting, and he only moved away from the mountains when he started attending senior high school. After finishing his military service, he passed exams to become a police officer and then a bailiff, but living in the plains didn’t suit him, and he ultimately chose to return to his village.

After getting married, Sula continued planting trees in the mountains, with the family’s livelihood depending entirely on the breakfast shop run by Dresedrese.

Learning from his parents

In the 1980s, there was disagreement in the community over whether it was right for local landowners to open up their forest land to logging companies, or whether it was more important to preserve the green mountains. Legeay, who was on the side of protecting the Rukai people’s traditional territory, bought his first piece of land at a place called Patesengane, and began planting trees there. Sula had studied hard and passed the exams to become a forest ranger, but seeing his community’s forests disappearing, he chose to return home to plant trees alongside his parents, which he has now been doing for 40 years.

“This lady here is our first-generation tree planting trainer,” says Sula, introducing his mother, Devadeva, who smiles at us bashfully. We ask: “Does Sula do a good job at planting trees?” His mom says with a smile: “Very good. He takes it very seriously.”

Cultivating seedlings of all kinds of trees at his own home, Sula says that older members of his community are very clear about what kinds of trees grow at elevations of 500, 1,000, or 1,500 meters above sea level, while the younger generation simply restore the forest based on the memories of their elders. Sula himself has learned the wisdom of the elders while living in the mountains, including how to identify trees, grasses, herbs, and vines, and their names in the Rukai language.

At the height of logging in Taiwan, vast numbers of trees were felled in the mountains of Wutai Township. Following the lead of his father Legeay, Sula Sukinadrimi has long been planting native tree species in these mountains. (courtesy of Dresedrese Pacengelaw)

The tree seedlings planted in the mountains by Sula and his family are all grown in the yard of his own home. (courtesy of Dresedrese Pacengelaw)

Supporting tree planting with a shop

When Sula Sukinadrimi was 36 he married his wife, Dresedrese Pacengelaw, who had returned from the city to open a breakfast shop, but he continued with his “unpaid job” of planting trees. The whole family’s finances have depended on the breakfast shop. Dresedrese says: “I have always felt that planting trees is the right thing to do, and that I should definitely support it.”

Following the landslides caused by Typhoon Morakot in 2009, five of the eight indigenous communities in Wutai Township relocated, leaving only the three communities of Kabalelradhane, Wutai, and Labuwan. The disaster also caused some tribe members to change their views and support Sula’s tree planting and forest conservation efforts, and they made abandoned and idle forest land on Mt. Cekesane available to Sula to plant more trees.

Sula takes us in his blue mini truck to the backyard of his parents’ old house to see their seedling nursery. A 50-year-old camphor tree gives off a refreshing fragrance and its shade protects the little seedlings. Sula looks around and says: “This is a dreamland.” Then he picks up a camphor seedling and adds: “This is a dream tree, and we are dreamers.”

Next he takes us to Cungurugan, located 500 meters above sea level, which is the third of the family’s tree planting areas. This is forest land that Dresedrese’s family bought with a loan and which they turned over to Sula and Dresedrese to grow trees on. The entrance to the slopeland site is not far, and there is a simple shelter covered by a tarpaulin that serves as a place for Sula to rest when he gets tired from planting trees. There is also a barrel that he uses to carry water into the forest for watering the saplings.

On a steep slope where tree seedlings are planted, Sula takes out a sharp sickle and deftly swings it up and down as he cuts out the weeds from the slopes between the natural terraces. Recently there has been a prolonged drought and the newly planted seedlings are barely clinging on to life, but the Malabar chestnut trees (Pachira aquatica) are still lushly verdant. Sula says with concern that the Malabar chestnut, an introduced ornamental tree, has been planted widely in the mountains and is squeezing out native species, causing a loss of biodiversity in what was once very diverse woodland.

A teacher named Xu from Tainan’s Jincheng Junior High School organized a team to go with Sula into the mountains and plant Japanese blue oak seedlings. Five years later the trees flowered and produced acorns, which served to cultivate more seedlings. (courtesy of Dresedrese Pacengelaw)

Speaking with trees

To restore mountain forests it is not enough to simply plant trees, for they must also be tended: They need to be watered and weeds pulled, to ensure that the little seedlings do not wither or become strangled by vines. Sula himself handles most of this labor-intensive work and says that only in this way will the trees grow quickly and have a good chance of survival.

Spending seven to eight hours a day in the forest, Sula often talks to the trees. Holding the tender leaves of a recently planted seedling in his hand, he says: “This one could soon wither and die, so I say to it things like ‘give it all you’ve got.’ If it’s a Malabar chestnut, before cutting it away I will first say to it, ‘I’m sorry, but you are growing in the wrong place.’”

When it comes time for lunch in the mountains, he eats a meal prepared by Dresedrese. The food comprises simple items like chicken nuggets, green onion pancakes, or steamed buns, with egg in a steamed bun or a meat-filled rice dumpling being considered a luxury. With the whole family’s finances dependent on the breakfast shop, it is not easy to make ends meet. Sula says contentedly: “I eat whatever my manager prepares for me.”

In the first few years after returning home to plant trees, Sula struggled repeatedly with the question of whether he should give up and return to the lowlands to make a better living, but ultimately he decided to stay in the mountains and carry on with the work that he loves. Looking at his wife, he says with gratitude: “I can’t live on nothing, but I never thought that after getting married I could carry on planting trees for 20 years. She’s the one who makes it all possible.”

Sula and his family plant trees in the mountains of Wutai to protect the environment. But it is not enough simply to plant seedlings—they must also weed the soil and cut away vines in order for the seedlings to grow quickly and have a high survival rate.

Tree planting is God’s work

Life has taught Sula the difficulty of his “unpaid profession” of tree planting. He says that in the past he was too naive—the reality is that he has no resources, and it is difficult to persuade the younger generation to return to their mountain communities to plant trees based on ­ideals alone. However, he says with humor: “We indigenous people have three champions: women’s weightlifting gold medalist Kuo Hsing-chun, Yang Yung-wei, who won first place at the Abu Dhabi Grand Slam judo tournament in 2021, and me—I’m the tree-planting champion.”

Indigenous peoples have the deepest understanding of the mountain forests, and, says Sula, “I know very well how many trees to plant.” He proposes a division of labor whereby the work of tree planting and protecting the mountain forests can be entrusted to the indigenous peoples. If the financial resources are there, young people can be attracted back to their communities and he can teach them to develop a feeling for the mountains and forests and to care for the land, just as his father taught him in the past. In this way the indigenous languages and cultures can naturally be kept alive. However, he stresses that they must share his ideals about trees.

Dresedrese believes that it is thanks to God’s will that they have been able to devote their efforts to restoring the mountain forests. “God looked down on us with approval and chose us for this task. One day, when we have gone home to Him in Heaven, at least we will have left behind these trees on this land to look after future generations on our behalf.”

On their three tree planting sites in the Damumu Mountains, totaling some 100 hectares of forest land, Sula Sukinadrimi and his family have planted nearly 10,000 trees, including Japanese blue oak, zelkova, and Formosan sweetgum. Before we set off on our journey back down to the lowlands, Sula points to the slopes covered with trees and says: “The day when I leave them will be the day that I go to Heaven.”

The Man Who Planted Trees, the best-known work of French author Jean Giono, tells the story of an isolated shepherd who dedicates his remaining life to reforestation. Seeking neither rewards nor recognition, he transforms a wasteland into a verdant paradise where people can happily live and work. This selfless soul who transforms the wilderness into a “land of milk and honey” has touched the hearts of millions of people around the world.

Taiwan’s own “man who plants trees,” Sula Suki­na­drimi, and his wife, Dresedrese Pacengelaw, have turned their love for the mountain forests into action to protect Taiwan. As for the rest of us, we can plant the seed of protecting the mountain forests in our own minds, and put our love for these woodlands into action too.

Citizens who support Sula Sukinadrimi’s tree-planting vision can adopt seedlings, thereby helping him to protect the mountain forests.