NTPD Observed With Pledge To Make Country Green

ISLAMABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 18th August, 2016) : National Tree Plantation Day (NTPD) was observed acrose the country on Thursday with the pledge to make the country green and pollution free. The government had declared August 18 in 2009 as the National Tree Planting Day (NTPD), aimed at addressing deforestation and associated environmental problems being faced by the nation. Media Director of Climate Change Ministry Saleem Shaikh told APP that tree plantation target of 153 million was set for the spring season while a target of 109 million tree plantation throughout the country was set for monsoon season. "Around 208 million trees were planted during the three-month spring season, which is staggeringly 55 million more than trees planted against the target of 153 million trees in short span of three months," Saleem Shaikh said. He said survival rate of the trees planted during the last tree plantation was 72 percent. He said tree plantation targets were set twice a year for spring season (February-March) and monsoon season (June-September).

replantations during these two crucial season were vital to boost tree cover to make the country climate-proof. "Role of forests in tackling climate change impacts, particularly floods, soil, wind and river erosions, sea-level rise, erratic and torrential rains, is now being recognized globally and so by the present Pakistani government," he said. Pakistan is home to forests over around 800,000 hectares, which constitutes to be five percent of the total land mass of the country. "But the country loses forests over some 27,000 hectares every year.

This trend of deforestation has exposed the country to the negative fallouts of the global warming-induced climate change," he highlighted. Saleem Shaikh explained "Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's ambitious Green Pakistan Programme is a clear indicator of the present government's unquestionable seriousness towards protecting socio-economic sectors, lives and livelihoods of the people from the climate change impacts, which have shown rise in frequency and intensity."