On July 2, 2020 Delhi Environment Minister Gopal Rai informed that a 17 day campaign ”Podhe Lagao, Paryavaran Bachao” (Plant Trees, Save Environment) will be launched from July 10 to July 26 from the National Highway(NH) 20 near ITO to reduce air pollution. During the campaign 31 lakh saplings will be planted.
Key Info
- Gopal Rai will inaugurate the plantation drive at ITO nursery near the Yamuna Bank on July 10.
- In addition to him, all the ministers, Speaker of the Delhi Legislative Assembly and the MLAs will also be present in the inauguration.
Total sapling
i.The 31 lakh saplings include 21 lakh big trees and 11 lakh shrubs.
ii.Out of the total sapling, 18 lakhs will be planted by various departments of the Delhi government, 9,40,000 will be sowed by Delhi Development Authority (DDA)
iii.Meanwhile, 2 lakh plant will be planted by Municipal Corporation and 2 lakh plants will also be planted by Delhi Metro, Northern Railways and BSES
Benefit of the campaign
Increase green cover-The plantation drive is likely to increase Delhi’s green area to 350 square kilometres(sq km) by 2021 from 325 sq km at present. In 2017, there was 299 sq km of green cover.
Reduce dust pollution– Shrubs will be planted at the side of the roads. This will reduce the dust pollution which is the major contributor to increase in PM10 particles, which are very small to be filtered out of the body.
Note– The Forest Research Institute at Dehradun will act as a third-party audit team to study the survival rate of the plantation i.e., how many trees and shrubs planted last year have sustained
About Delhi:
Chief Minister(CM)– Arvind Kejriwal
Governor– Anil Baijal
