Lira, December 12, 2023 – Caritas Lira plants to distribute 100,000 tree seedlings for planting in the districts of Lango Sub-region as one of mitigating the effects of climate change.
The tree seedlings will include pine, Neem, Grevillea, Eucalyptus, musizi, and mahogany among others.
The beneficiary districts include Kole, Dokolo, Alebtong, and Otuke, much as Lango Sub-region has other districts such as Lira, Apac, Oyam, Amolatar, and Lira City.
This year Caritas Lira, a non-governmental organisation, has given out a total of 3,600 tree seedlings to people in the region.
Rev. Fr. Boniface Okori Acuma, the Director of Caritas Lira who was speaking days ago, acknowledged that Lira Diocese has been engaging them to plant trees in a bid to restore green environment.
Okori said in the next distribution, they will even reach to other entities to plant more trees in the region, which sometimes faces adverse climatic changes such as prolonged drought and floods.
He stressed the importance of farmers adopting climate smart agriculture, which he said ensures the sustainable use of natural resources like land and forests.
“We advocate for climate smart agriculture, we have been engaged by the Diocese of Lira to plant trees and we have distributed trees to all our parishes of selected districts in 2023,” he said, adding that next year they will distribute seedlings to institutions such sub-county head offices for the political leaders and staff to plant.
“We are looking at greening our environment, and we are planting trees because we see that it is one of the ways of mitigating the challenges related to climate change,” Okori said.
Okori said that they are giving out tree seedlings that mature faster so that the beneficiaries can also generate income from them in a sustainable way.
Samuel Okwir a resident of Agweng parish, Alango Sub-county, Otuke district said households in the villages have availed land for tree planting.
“We have access to land because we live in the village, we can utilise the pieces of land we have to plant trees. We will be glad if they continue giving us more seedlings for planting,” Okwir said.
He added that planting of trees will help protect their environment , adding that they will report anyone who destroys the environment to the local authorities.
“These [trees] will help protect our soil, houses from strong winds, and also brings us rain, some people are so reckless in their actions .They burn bushes to open up farmlands, but we shall use our local leaders to help put such people to order so that our environment is protected,” he added.
Meanwhile Elizabeth Atim a resident of Otuke district said that planting trees like eucalyptus will help her generate some income for her family as they mature fast.
The Bishop of Lira Diocese, Sanctus Lino Wanok, urged the people to conserve their land through good farming practices like mulching and intercropping to maintain fertility, which he said is good for the growth of the trees as well.
“Our people must realise that the earth is alive, and we need to cooperate with Mother Earth. We need to control the disposal of plastics because it is suffocating our land, and we must make sure that the trees are planted in the right places to control soil erosion,” Lino said.
He cautioned farmers against bush burning, saying it destroys the top layer of the soil. “Some of you are very aggressive with fire, you burn down the grass and yet they it is very important. Don’t burn the grass, respect it, let it rot, the termites will work on it and turn it into manure,” he said.
Planting trees is in line with Uganda’s vision 2040 intended to restore forest cover up to 24 percent as it was in the 1990s. Forest area in Uganda was reported at 11.45 percent in 2021, according to the World Bank collection of development indicators, compiled from officially recognised sources.
https://thecooperator.news/fruit-tree-planting-initiative-launched-in-sembabule-district/
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