ISLAMABAD: Federal Minister for Climate Change Zahid Hamid on Monday informed the interprovincial and the inter-departmental meeting that the spring plantation campaign 2017 would be inaugurated on February 9 across Pakistan.
Chairing the meeting, he appreciated efforts of all provinces, federating units and public and private sector organisations for the plantation in 2016. He informed the participants that the National Forest Policy has been approved by the Council of Common Interest.
He said that the policy has been formulated by the support of all the provinces. The plantation campaign would be implemented keeping in view the new forest policy and the Prime Minister’s Green Pakistan Programme. Prime Minister’s focal person on Climate Change Rizwan Mehboob informed the meeting that the Green Pakistan Programme was in its final phase of releasing funds to the provinces and the federating units.
He said that the Planning Commission has instructed to plant 20% of trees in educational institutions and involve elected representatives in the planation campaign. He said that awareness and monitoring mechanism would also be emphasized in Spring Plantation Campaign 2017. The federal minister was briefed about the planation targets set and achieved in 2016.
The Punjab Forest Department set target of nine million trees and progress rate of Punjab is 13.9 million. The Sindh Forest Department informed the meeting that they set target of 10 million and achieved 7.2 million. The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Forest Department told the audience that the target set was 70 million and they achieved 83% of the set target.
The Forest Department of Azad Jammu Kashmir said that they set target of one million and achieved 0.958 million. The Forest Department of Gilgit Baltistan set target of one million. The Forest Department of FATA set target of 0.86 million and achieved 3.115 million. Besides Climate Change Secretary Syed Ahmed Abu Akif, Forests Inspector General Syed Mehboob Nasir, representatives of the National Highway Authority, Ministry of Defence, International Union of Conservation of Nature (IUCN), the Capital Development Authority and others also attended the meeting.
