The Minister for Lands and Natural Resources, Samuel Abu Jinapor, has explained that the reason for the upcoming tree planting exercise is to awaken citizens consciousness on the need to plant more trees.

Speaking at a presser on the upcoming exercise on Friday, June 11, 2021, the minister said the exercise dubbed;“The Green Ghana Project” is seeking to restore the forest cover and conscientise citizens to appreciate and understand the need for tree planting.

“The project of ‘Greening Ghana’ is a very important national undertaking which seeks to restore the forest cover of our country in the short to medium term. This is to say the least and therefore the time for action is now.”
Samuel Jinapor

According to the Minister, as at the year 1900, the forest cover of Ghana stood at 8,200,000 hectares. The forest cover he revealed has declined by 80%, leaving the current forest cover at 1, 600,000 hectares.

Mr. Jinapor stated that the nation has come to this point gradually through years of systematic degradation and forest degradation without commensurate afforestation. He added that, the nation has utilized its forest cover and resources unsustainably. This, he said, stems from the issues of small-scale mining, harvesting of trees in a very unsustainable manner.

“And it is therefore the reason why in an accordance with the President’s vision, the ‘Green Ghana Project’ was launched.”
Samuel Jinapor

Tree planting well thought out

The Lands Minister also posited that, the program is a well thought out program which is going to, over a period of time, implement policy programs and action plans which is going to relook the restoration of the forest cover of the nation.

“The Green Ghana Project is a project which is going to take about 4 to 5 years. By that time, we believe that the cover would have been restored.”
Samuel Jinapor

He further noted that the ministry wants tree planting to become part of the citizens activities. Also

“We want this undertaking to be national in character and also be a collective action. It has to be the responsibility of all of us that is the political parties, faith-based organizations, social clubs and educational institutions, diplomatic bodies. They should help mostly in terms of funding.”
Samuel Jinapor

The lands and natural resource minister further stated that, the ministry is putting in measures to get more seedlings to have enough seedlings dotted across the country.

“As we speak, the Forestry Commission under the supervision of the ministry of lands and natural resources has worked out a program that has resulted in the production of some 6 million seedlings. It is going to be distributed to all Forestry Commission offices, their regional offices and various vantage locations across the country.”
Samuel Jinapor

Guidelines to be provided for tree planting

He further indicated that guidelines will be given to all persons interested in planting the trees. Additionally, he noted that after the tree planting,;participants must take it upon themselves to nurture the plants till its maturity stage.

“As part of the program, we are seeking to work out a plan which will see to it that the trees planted will be economic trees. We are talking about timber, Wawa, Neem. we are talking about Rosewood, shea trees. The rational for this intervention is so that,;in planting the trees we are also making an investment for the future.
Samuel Jinapor

Moreover, he said a monitoring and evaluation team will be setup to monitor how well these trees do after the planting exercise. He added that a comprehensive report will also be present;to account for the trees during the first anniversary of the exercise.