ISLAMABAD, July 18: The environment minister, Barrister Shahida Jamil, has expressed her dissatisfaction with the slow progress of the spring tree plantation campaign.

She was presiding over an inter-provincial ministerial meeting for Monsoon Tree Plantation Campaign 2002, held in the ministry on Thursday.

The meeting was attended by senior officers from all the provincial forest departments, including the AJK and Northern Areas, and representatives from federal ministries and provincial organizations. The progress of the plantation drive in the current year was also reviewed in the meeting.

The minister said, previously, the desired results had not been achieved due to lack of coordination and collaboration between the provincial and federal departments.

She stressed the need for an integrated effort by the federal and provincial environment and forest departments for an effective tree plantation campaign.

The minister told the meeting that President Gen Pervez Musharraf had stressed to enhance tree cover in the country through issuance of some directives to the authorities concerned.

Under the directives, all the ministries and provinces will undertake afforestation on public lands available with different departments from next season. The private sector will be involved in this regard.

In addition to this, the provincial governments will establish an effective monitoring and evaluation system with the involvement of all the stakeholders, including local communities, to assess the progress of the campaign on regular basis.

The environment minister said Pakistan was a country with variety of environments and varied ecosystems, therefore, effective, meaningful and pragmatic planning, involving all the stakeholders, was required for handling the specific environmental conditions of each area.

While reviewing the progress of the Spring Tree Plantation Campaign 2002, the meeting was informed that 57.182 million plants had been planted during the spring season against a target of 72.048 million. However, the NWFP forest department and some other agencies were successful in meeting their targets. The shortfall in the targets was attributed to prolonged drought and lack of adequate financial resources to raise nurseries by the provincial governments.

The meeting discussed the target for the tree plantation campaign and it was decided that 74,755 million plants would be planted during the current monsoon season. It was decided that at the national level, the campaign would be started on August 29, and, subsequently, the provincial governments would organize the campaign as per the schedule decided during the meeting.

The meeting also decided that presidential cash award and certificates would be given to the successful educational institutions which carried out best tree plantations on their campuses.