BY MENGISTEAB TESHOME
There is no doubt that, like many big transboundary issues, strong efforts of individual countries in environmental protection and fighting climate change will be more successful when they are executed through collaboration.
The impacts of climate change are also transboundary by their very nature. Hence cross border environmental protection efforts would become more meaningful in realizing both local and international goals of addressing climate change.
Countries in East and Horn of Africa are now in a more enabling situation to work hand in hand in addressing climate change. One of such areas is the ongoing effective afforestation campaign in Ethiopia: the Green Legacy Initiative.
Ethiopia’s Green Legacy Initiative is acknowledged and considered as an exemplary move to the Horn of African countries, particularly to the semi-arid East African climate, because the effort is bought by many fellow Africans and pushing them to partake in massive plantations.
Ethiopian Environment, Forest and Climate Change Commission is working with various development and private partners because it pays back the Green Legacy. The country has a national grand plan to plant 20 billion trees in five years.
In recent development the Commission notified 1 billion seedlings preparation commenced in a bid to supply neighboring countries to make them part of the next year’s Green Legacy Initiative.
Speaking to The Ethiopian Herald Forest development Director General, Bitew Shibabaw said the Commission with other pertinent stakeholders is working to supply neighboring countries with 1 billion seedlings that could cope up desertification across the region.
The Green Legacy initiative is part of the Government’s plan to plant 20 billion seedlings by 2024 launched by Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed in 2019. The expansion of Green Legacy initiative to neighboring nations could help to curb desert expansion and increase productivity.
Ethiopia is planning to plant 6 billion seedlings in the coming year. This year Eritrea, Sudan, South Sudan Djibouti and Kenya are amongst nations that will join the initiative be supplied with, he reiterated.
Nearly 5 billion acres of land is degraded; this degradation happens in this part of Africa in many forms: clearing of forests; soil erosion; or the decline of nutrients in the soil, all of which result in less productive land.
The loss of soil fertility is dragging down agricultural yields, especially for poor farmers who cannot invest in fertilizers to replace the natural nutrients that are washed away when soil erodes.
According to him, the ministry of agriculture is on duty preparing over 5 billion as the commission is also working to supply only one billion. To translate the effort to the ground potential seedlings producing seedling nursery sites are selected and the Green Legacy Initiative believed contributed a lot to Ethiopia and Eritrea, Sudan, South Sudan Djibouti and Kenya in environmental restoration and conservation efforts too.
Because planting trees is currently seen as an alternative livelihood strategy, particularly in drier areas, where drought is frequent, soils are very poor, and use of fertilizers and improved seeds is risky and less profitable putting hands together is fundamental move.
Ethiopia’s last year’s campaign was accompanied by a representative of the Africa Union and the UN Economic Commission for Africa, whose support for this ambitious action was crucial to tackle the effects of deforestation and climate change at international level.
According to the United Nations’ estimates, Ethiopia’s forest coverage has declined drastically to as low as four per cent in the 2000s from 35 per cent a century earlier. Afforestation is the most effective climate change solution to date and with the new record set by Ethiopia, other African nations should take this exemplary move of Ethiopia’s green legacy.
As in last year, many African countries will hopefully be engaged in massive tree planting campaigns to reverse the declining forest cover. With the support from the UN Environment Programme, Kenya had launched the “Greening Kenya Initiative” in the previous year.
Of course, the UN Environment Programme is working with countries across the continent to replicate such initiatives to stop deforestation and increase forest cover. This is crucial in honoring African countries’ commitments to mitigate climate change and contribute to the preservation of the global ecosystem restoration.
In general, the greening initiatives are likely to be effective interventions as they can be executed through the mass mobilization of the people, the private sector and civil society with little demand for external support.
The Ethiopian Herald December 29/2020
