Trees are good for contemplation. Plato and Aristotle did their best thinking in the groves of olives and figs around Athens, and Buddha found enlightenment beneath a bo or peepul tree.
I cannot significantly improve on the assertion that it simply is proper for us, as intelligent members of the universe, to try to look after our fellow creatures, and evil for us to do otherwise.
Trees are right at the heart of all the necessary debates: ecological, social, economic, political, moral, religious.
GMOs could really land us in trouble