10 billion trees: Delay in approval, release of funds may mar project

PESHAWAR: The 10-billion trees afforestation project in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and the merged districts has already been started and great progress has been made so far, but delay in the formal approval of the project and release of funds is feared to affect its success as the Forest Department has been unable to make necessary payments for the purpose.

The first billion tree afforestation project was launched in 2014, which was renewed last year with the 10-billion tree afforestation project under the green Pakistan initiative of the federal government. The new project was inaugurated by Prime Minister Imran Khan at a ceremony in Haripur in September 2018.

So far expenses of nearly Rs1.5 billion have been made of the Rs27 billion projects which would last until June 2023, sources in the forest department told The News.

Departmental nurseries at an area of 543 hectares as well as 117 private nurseries have so far been established and 138.22 million seedlings have been raised.

Also, plantation and sowing have been carried out at an area of 16,994 hectares under the new initiative across the province including the new districts, while 26 million saplings have been planted and freely distributed, the sources said. Similarly, 1632 more closures have been set up mostly in the merged districts. However, the major problems involved with the massive activity carried out by the forest department during the past less than a year was the delay in payments to the employees, workers of the department and nursery holders, which is feared to leave adverse effects on the success of the project.

Soon after the inauguration of the project by the prime minister in September last year, the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa forest department, which had already got enough experience in the activity after successful completion of a similar project, took lead and started the activities. Simultaneously, they moved PC-1 for the project, which was approved by the provincial cabinet and the chief minister.

However, at the federal level, the project was delayed until July 2019 - next financial year - creating problems for the forest department. It was on July 4, that the PC-1 was formally recommended by the central development working committee (CDWC) to the executive committee of the national economic council (ECNEC), which would take another few weeks for formal approval. Once the PC-1 is approved by the ECNEC, the release of funds would be possible and thus payments to employees and nursery holders could be made.

Prime Minister Imran Khan had also announced up-gradation of the employees of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa forest department at a mega ceremony in Convention Center Islamabad last year to celebrate the successful completion of billion tree afforestation project. This announcement too could not be materialized causing uncertainty among the forest department employees.

The government needs to focus attention on these issues to ensure the success of the new project under which another one billion trees would be planted in the province.

The sources said the forest department proved successful in the completion of the first billion trees afforestation project as forestation was made over an area of 230,000 hectares and nearly 5000 closures were established wherein 1.2 billion were grown through the plantation and natural regeneration. For the purpose jobs were given to more than 500,000 people, the sources added.

Some reports suggested that the recent large scale fires in different parts of the province were a deliberate effort to hide the failure of the billion tree project. But, high-ups of the provincial forest department rubbished the notion as baseless.

They say that so huge was the quantum of the plantation made in the province during the last five years under the billion tree initiative that it could not be undone through such fires in which just a few hundred thousand trees have been burnt. Still, they believe that urgent steps have been taken to control the fire incidents and formal standard operating procedures have been formulated to this effect. The forest department officials count several reasons for the fires. The issue has also been thoroughly investigated by several inquiry committees formed by the department to look into the matter. Some of the fires were broken out as a result of sabotage activities, others due to personal and family feuds.

In some cases the landlords had lit the fire to burn the dried grass, while in some incidents the fires had broken out as a result of the influx of tourists to the scenic forested areas who normally take little care of the fire while cooking food and other stuff, the forest official argued.