Uttar Pradesh is set to increase its green cover with the state government’s mega plantation drive from July 1.

Under the drive, 35 crore saplings will be planted across the state till August 15.

On August 15, 75 saplings will be planted in each village of the state to mark Azadi ka Amrit Varsh.

Chairing a high-level review meeting, Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath said that with the spirit of Indian culture of conservation of nature, there was a need to take forward the tree plantation campaign as a mass movement. He said as the massive tree plantation drive was going to start, a detailed programme should be prepared in this regard to make this campaign a big success.

Additional Chief Secretary (Environment, Forest and Climate Change) Manoj Singh said that in the last few years, the state government had worked tirelessly to increase the green cover in Uttar Pradesh. He said there were over 58,000 villages in Uttar Pradesh and the government planned to plant over 43.5 lakh saplings in a day on August 15.

“Efforts are being made by the Forest department to increase the green cover in the state which will help in pollution control,” he said.

According to the State of Forest Report-2021, 9.23 per cent of the total geographical area of Uttar Pradesh has forest cover. In 2013, it was 8.82 per cent. There has been an increase of 91 square kilometres in the total forest cover and tree cover during 2019.

“The government has now set a target to further enhance this area to 15 per cent by 2030. For this, the government will plant 175 crore saplings in the next five years. And for this, the Yogi Adityanath government has been doing intensive plantation during the rainy season since its first tenure. As a result, 101.49 crore saplings have been planted with the efforts of the government between 2017-18 and 2021-2022,” Singh said.

Indigenous plants like banyan, peepal, pakad, neem, bael, amla, mango, jackfruit, and drumstick will get preference during the plantation drive. The intention of the government is that the plantation during the rainy season should be according to the agro-climatic zone of the area concerned. Twenty-seven departments, including the Forest department, together will make the ‘Mission 35 Crore’ successful.

The nodal agency for plantation is the Forest department. But apart from it, 26 other departments will participate in the grand tree plantation campaign. The target of each department has already been fixed. The highest target of 12.60 crore and 12.32 crore saplings is for Forest and Rural Development departments respectively. Apart from this, the target of the Agriculture and Horticulture departments is 2.35 crore and 1.55 crore saplings respectively.

Environment fighters will also play an important role in making this campaign a success. Farmers and beneficiaries of prime minister's award in the environment, empowered force, women, disabled, low-income group, visually impaired, MGNREGA job card holders, self-help groups, village level and city development workers, forest workers, tribal-forest, Chief Minister Abhyudaya Yojana beneficiaries, teacher-students, and women will also be involved in the tree plantation campaign.