Monday’s planting campaign aims to surpass Ethiopia’s own record – PM

Addis Ababa, July 16, 2023 (FBC) – The Green Legacy Initiative aspires to protect, cherish, venerate, and prosper Ethiopia, as well as change the course of history and bequeath its legacy to the next generation, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed (PhD) said.

In a bid to surpass its own record set last year, Ethiopia is attempting to plant 500 million seedlings tomorrow, July 17, 2023. It is to be remembered that Ethiopia planted a record 350 million trees in a single day last year and tomorrow’s countrywide campaign aims to surpass that record by 150 million.

In a quest to cover every acre of land with plants, preparations have been completed across Ethiopia to plant 500 million tree seedlings on Monday (17 July).

In a post published today on his social media pages, Prime Minister Abiy stated that Monday’s planting campaign intends to break a record of planting most trees in a 12 hour period as part of the country’s Green Legacy initiative. “Our objective is to break our own record,” the Premier noted.

“Our competition is with ourselves. We believe that regions, zones, woredas and villages will break their own records by planting more seedlings than last year. Each of us has to break our own records,” he said.

Emphasizing his readiness to plant many more seedlings tomorrow, PM Abiy urged all Ethiopians to be ready in order to break their previous record by planting many more trees on July 17, 2023.

“We choose the first day of the week, Monday, to kick off our working days by saving nature,” he added.

Recall that on July 8 Prime Minister Abiy entrusted Ethiopians to make history by planting 500 million tree seedlings in a single day (on July 17, 2023) and set a new planting record. He also called on foreigners living in Ethiopia, embassies, employees of international organizations, and transit passengers to be part of history as Ethiopia gears up for a new chapter of green legacy history.

By the end of this year’s Green Legacy planting season, Ethiopia will have planted 31 billion seedlings since the campaign was introduced by the Prime Minister in 20219.

Prior to the launch of the 2023 seedling planting, Ethiopia’s Ministry of Agriculture announced in April that the country has planned to plant 6.3 billion trees during the current [5th round] Green Legacy planting season.

Out of the total trees to be planted this summer, the Ministry said 45 percent are aimed to boost the forest coverage while 55 are tailored to integrate agriculture practices and horticultural purposes.

On July 15, 2023, the Ministry also confirmed that 60 percent of the 6.5 billion seedlings being planted nationwide this summer are fruits.