PESHAWAR: Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government has decided to plant and distribute 5.726 million seedlings in upcoming tree plantation campaign during the monsoon season 2024.

The decision was made in a meeting regarding the monsoon tree plantation season 2024 here on Thursday. KP Chief Secretary Muhammad Abid Majeed chaired the meeting, while Secretary Climate Change,Forestry Environment & Wildlife Department Shahid Zaman· , senior officials of the Forest Department, and representatives of all the departments concerned attended the meeting.

The senior officials of the KP Forest Department gave a detailed presentation on the “Green Growth Strategy- Billion Tree plus Plantation Drive”. The meeting was informed that planting stock of 6.120 million seedlings was available with the Forest Department, out of which 5.726 million were fit for planting. “This stock is to be distributed across regions and circles as per the activity-wise plantation plan,” the meeting informed.

The forest officials told that 0.252 million seedlings were designated for planting through village development committees on specified planting days, and the armed forces were set to plant 1.191 million seedlings, while educational and religious institutions were allocated 0.346 million seedlings.

The meeting decided that all the stakeholders, district governments, TMAs and developmental authorities should not rely only on the provision of plants from Forest Department but they must ensure to procure the feasible plants from open market on the advice of the forestry’s representatives.

Besides, it was also decided that the schools and other institutions might also decide to arrange the procurement of required plants from local markets out of parents-teacher committee (PTC) funds or other available funds, if the required samplings were not available with the local forestry department for plantation during the monsoon drive.

The meeting also decided that the slogan for the plantation campaign was “Har Bashar- Ek Shajar”, and it should be promoted in all media interactions by the officials concerned.

Published in Dawn, July 19th, 2024