LUCKNOW: Lucknow division will be greener than other districts after the plantation drive this year.
As part of Vriksharopan Janandolan 2021, this year’s massive plantation exercise encompasses planting 30 crore trees across the state.
The forest department alone would plant more than a crore trees in the division, while other departments could plant another 2.3 crore.
Overall, around 3.4 crore trees would be planted in the division.
Following the state capital would be Kanpur, which would get around 2.5 crore trees.
Of these, the forest department would plant at least 1.2 crore while the remaining would be by other government departments.
Chief conservator of forests Mukesh Kumar said, “The targets have been fixed for all departments, districts and divisions.
The forest department would supply saplings accordingly.” Chitrakoot and Ayodhya divisions would get around 1.2 crore trees and Devipatan at least 1.9 crore.
Prayagraj, Varanasi, Bareilly, Mirzapur, Moradabad, Agra, Jhansi and Meerut divisions would each get more than a crore of trees in the drive.
According to an assessment by the forest department, based on the fact that a healthy tree produces 225.8 litres of oxygen every day and a person consumes 550 litres in a day, 30 crore trees (if all survive) would generate enough oxygen to meet the daily requirement of around 12.3 crore people.
Another environmental benefit of these trees would be carbon sequestration (carbon stored by trees).
A single tree sequesters 5.8kg carbon on an average in a year.
The 30 crore trees would sequester at least 175 crore kg of carbon.