Ant Forest
Advertiser
- Alipay, run by Alibaba, is the most used third-party online payment in China, which has 400 million of registered users.
Objective / insight
- Ant Financial is a new service offered by Alipay, an online payment technology company of Alibaba
- Alibaba wanted to use its giant base of users to reduce carbon emission and to encourage them to choose green lifestyles
Implemented strategy
- Ant Forest is an interface integrated in the App Alipay
- Users will be able to claim a virtual seeding then start the tree-planting activity
- They need to continue implementing low-carbon consumption behaviors, to lowering their carbon credits and to be able to grow the virtual tree
- After the green energy supplies reached 17.9KG, the virtual tree will turn into a real Haloxylon tree in the desert of Alashan desert of Inner Mongolia
- Users’ carbon account, which can be shared on the App in-built social network or other platforms like Wechat, brings people the satisfaction of maintaining sustainable behaviors
Technology implemented
- Ant Forest tracks purchases made through its Alipay payment platform to award “green energy points”
- A computing system, combined with geo-localization, counts the amount of reduced carbon emission based on users’ behavior : such as non-cash payment in-store using Alipay, or walking to their office which is 1 mile away instead of taking Uber
- The reduced carbon emission will be transformed into “green energy points” to award users
- An in-built social network in the App allows users to share scores of green energy points and compete with friends
Result
- Ant Forest had over 220 million users
- A total of 8.45 million trees has been planted
- Reducing more than 2,500 tons of carbon emissions every day
