Are you a municipality? Make Maple Leaf Day your day.

[ Community, Date ]: For the first time in [ the community's ] history, Mayor [ x ] of the [ Town/City ] of [ xx ] has declared September 22nd, 2010 to be "Maple Leaf Day". The celebration will include a number of activities including tree dedications, plantings, educational workshops, outdoor educational tours, schoolyard plantings and seminars.

"We are proud to be able to share this community initiative with Tree Canada and Home Hardware", said the Mayor. "Trees are a very important part of us and we want to make sure that the environmental and economic benefits to our citizens are celebrated", he/she said.

This is the first time that one official day has been set aside to celebrate trees in Canada - it coincides with National Forest Week, the last week of September. The maple is one of 306 species of trees that grow in Canada - well known as the symbol of Canada as seen on our flag and present in one species or another in almost all parts of the country. Canada's aboriginal peoples used maple sap before the arrival of Europeans, the value of maple for everything from high grade wood products, to maple syrup to, in the case of Manitoba maple regenerating difficult sites like old rock quarries, and even as a beautiful ornamental urban tree, are well known.

Looking into the future this symbol will not lose any of its relevance - challenges like global warming need to be faced in which the role of trees will only gain in importance.

With 10% of the world's forest, Canada is indeed a forest nation. But are we a forest people? With 80% of us living in cities and towns, sometimes we forget how much trees lend to our lives in terms of air and soil quality, aesthetics and psychological well-being. For this reason, we must celebrate a tree day we can call our own - Maple Leaf Day!