Ethiopia plants over 350 million trees in a day to combat climate change

Ethiopia has planted over 350 million trees within a 12 hour period, breaking the record of 50 million set by India in 2016. The scheme is part of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s “Green Legacy” initiative, a scheme which aims to plant over 4 million indigenous trees in Ethiopia across 1,000 sites. In the 2000s, Ethiopia’s tree coverage was just 4%, despite the country having 35% coverage just a century before. Replanting trees not only removes carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, but can stop land degradation, and desertification. Furthermore, trees provide shade, shelter, food, and if properly managed can provide a carbon-neutral fuel source.

Videos encouraging the public to plant and take care of trees have been run on state media, urging each citizen to plant 40 seedling trees over the summer. Some public offices were shut for the day of the plant, to allow civil servants to take part in the planting, who were joined by staff from the United Nations, African Union, and members of foreign embassies in Ethiopia. Officials were assigned to count the number of trees planted, and on Monday evening, the Minister for Innovation and Technology tweeted that a total of 353, 663, 330 seedlings had been planted.

The scheme is part of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s “Green Legacy” initiative, a scheme which aims to plant over 4 million indigenous trees in Ethiopia across 1,000 sites. In the 2000s, Ethiopia’s tree coverage was just 4%, despite the country having 35% coverage just a century before

Just last year, a climate report by the UN suggested that planting one billion hectares of new forests could help to combat worldwide climate change. Ethiopia’s approach follows that of Niger, Mali and Senegal, where each country has planted of 2 million trees as part of an initiative to build a “great green wall”- an 8,000 km wall of trees planted in the sub-Sahara. In October 2018, the UK government pledged £60 million to tree planting, £10 million of which is for planting trees in rural areas. Despite this, the UK is on track to see a fall in tree number in the next five years due to a deadly fungus that threatens ash trees.