Tree planting is becoming a trend worldwide. This summer, India planted 220 million trees in a single day. Australia plans to plant 1 billion trees by 2030. Central European countries, the Czech Republic, will plant 10 million trees this fall. The German government is preparing large-scale investments in forest restoration. Ethiopia broke the world record this year and planted 350 million trees in 12 hours.
As drought troubles Ethiopia, the government promised to plant 4 trillion trees across the country in one summer in the name of a tree-planting campaign. Part of this initiative is the prevention of further deforestation and climate change in their land which has a lot of drought.
Government Support
According to The Guardigan, the government has asked citizens to plant at least 40 seedlings per person. Public authorities offered their employees a day off to join the planting.
Getahun Mekuria, Minister of Innovation and Technology of Ethiopia, announced and shared the information, 350 million trees were planted within 12 hours. The possible world record came because: “If proven, the achievement is truly record-breaking, shattering the current world record for planting trees in a single day, which stands at 50 million trees planted in India in 2016.”
The United Nations have reported that Ethiopia’s forest coverage has had an enormous decline from 35% of total land in the 1900’s, to only 4% in the 2000’s.
The Main Goal
One of the main objectives is to combat climate change and drought. Another objective is to improve living conditions for people, including the use of new agricultural land. There is a need to ensure better social development in the country. Citizens are often forced to migrate from mere despair from the poor regions of the country.
Head of Centre for Wood Science and Technology at Edinburgh Napier University, Dan Ridley-Ellis also told the Guardian: “Trees not only help mitigate climate change by absorbing the carbon dioxide in the air, but they also have huge benefits in combating desertification and land degradation, particularly in arid countries. They also provide food, shelter, fuel, fodder, medicine, materials and protection of the water supply. This truly impressive feat is not just the simple planting of trees, but part of a huge and complicated challenge to take account of the short- and long-term needs of both the trees and the people. The forester’s mantra ‘the right tree in the right place’ increasingly needs to consider the effects of climate change, as well as the ecological, social, cultural and economic dimension.”
People, countries, nations, they are all increasingly aware of the importance of trees to us and our future generations. Let’s look forward to more news and programs on forest regeneration.
Read More: http://www.trueactivist.com/ethiopia-has-most-likely-broken-a-world-record-by-simply-planting-350-million-tress-all-across-the-country-in-12-hours-t1/, flickr.com, pixabay.com
