Consumers in the USA and “a number of EU markets” can now apply for a debit card made from wood that also comes in a digital form and can be used to make contactless and mobile payments as well as cash withdrawals from banks and ATMs.

With the debit card, users will not have to pay a fee, instead, TreeCard makes money from interchange – a fee that stores have to pay on each transaction. TreeCard teamed up with Ecosia, the search engine that focuses on reforestation. Ecosia will spend 80% of the income from interchange to plant trees, it estimates that customers will need to spend $60 to fund a new tree.

TreeCard is unique because it’s made from sustainably sourced FSC cherry wood. If you find it a little hypocritical that a firm that plants trees is using wood to make cards you’ll be pleased to hear that a single tree can create 300,000 cards. By using wood, TreeCard and Ecosia do not have to use plastic which takes a very long time to decompose. Goodbye, plastic.

TreeCard has opened a waiting list for those wishing to apply for an account and expects to begin shipping the cards in early 2021.

Source: TreeCard/Ecosia

[https://www.treecard.org](https://www.treecard.org)