islamabad - The federal government has asked provincial governments to hammer out respective plans and submit them to the federal government along with financial requirement for implementation of the Prime Minister’s five-year flagship Green Pakistan Programme (GPP) across the country.
Syed Mahmood Nasir, Inspector General Forest of the Climate Change Ministry, told the media yesterday, “As part of implementation of the Green Pakistan Programme, we have written formal letters to the concerned authorities of provincial and Gilgit-Baltistan, Azad Jammu & Kashmir and FATA governments to roll out detailed project plans that should include areas identified for plantation of trees and programmes for protection and conservation of wildlife species. They have also been asked to submit their financial requirements for implementation of the forest plans in their respective areas.”
Nasir said that the marathon programme aims to reinvigorate ailing forestry sector in the country and protect the wildlife animals and plants from extinction, had been envisioned by the Prime Minister Muhammad Nawaz Sharif, which reflects his seriousness towards tackling deforestation and the negative impacts of climate change through forests. He said that under the Green Pakistan Programme, over 100 million trees would be planted across the country at a cost of Rs 10 billion during the next five years (2016-2016), for which the prime minister has allocated initially two billion rupees for the next two years (2016-17 and 2017-18). Developed in extensive and intensive consultation with all provincial governmental and non-governmental stakeholders, the programme has been chiselled in line with relevant component on the Environment and Climate Change of Vision 2025 and 11th Five Year Development Plan (2013-18) approved by the Planning Commission, the senior forest said.
He hoped that the international 2030 UN development agenda known as Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) would pave the way for environmentally-sound solutions, with forest conservation and protection being at the top of the agenda.
He informed the media that under SDGs target 15.2, each country has responsibility to protect, enhance and sustainably manage its forest areas by 2030.
He said that Pakistan is among the top forest-deficient countries of the world, having total forest cover of the country of about 5 % of its total land area. He said that the rate of deforestation is very high, which is causing serious problems including land degradation, soil erosion, loss of biological diversity, flash floods and various other associated ecological threats. In hilly areas of the country natural forests are subjected to heavy pressure of human activities of different kinds. In the context of climate change and the impacts of global warming protecting natural forests have now become a significant policy imperative of any country to ensure its economic growth, environmental stability and long term social security, he added.