The Anambra State Government has concluded plans to plant one million trees in the state as part of efforts to curb the increasing menace of gully erosion, which has eaten deep into the land mass of the state.

Speaking to Journalists in Awka, the Managing Director of Awka Capital Territory Development Authority (ACTDA), Mr. Michael Okonkwo, who doubles as the Chairman of the steering committee of the tree planting exercise, said his committee had visited Lagos State to understudy their Greenery Projects, aimed at developing Parks and Gardens at strategic areas.

He noted that Anambra State would soon replicate some of the Greenery Projects similar to what is obtainable in Lagos State in order to check the menace of erosion and soil degradation.

According to Okonkwo, the tree planting exercise would enhance the re-forestation programme of state and federal governments designed to address the challenges of deforestation and its attendant consequences on the environment.

He further said that the state government would also embark on a state-wide campaign for individuals, religious bodies and organisations to key into the exercise, adding that arrangements have also been put in place for every school child in the state to plant a tree.

The ACTDA boss explained that the exercise would commence with the planting of over six thousand trees along the Enugu-Onitsha expressway within the Awka Capital Territory as a pilot project, while the entire state would be covered within the shortest possible period.

He said that in order to ensure that the trees were protected and nurtured, the Forestry Department of the Ministry of Environment and the Ministry of Agriculture, have been equipped to take full responsibility of protecting the young plants but however regretted that individuals and communities living in erosion prone areas have not done enough to checkmate the incidence of environmental degradation and urged them to embrace the programme for their own good.

•Photo shows gully erosion site in Anambra.

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