Plea to observe National Plantation Day

By Abdul Qadir Qureshi
(Pakistan News & Features Services)

A social welfare organization has appealed to the Government of Pakistan to observe National Plantation Day on August 18. 

Shahida Kausar Farooq, Honorary Chairperson of Subh-e-Nau, an environment and public health entity, has urged Prime Minister Imran Khan and his cabinet to approve the National Plantation Day in the larger national interest.

“The government can easily implement it to motivate and facilitate people through media and their tiger force,” she reckoned.

“Let me share how it all started. I had lobbied the campaign for several years and firstly we had suggested for August 14. But for some reasons this date was not agreed. Probably it was not meant to be done on the Independence Day,” Shahida Kausar recalled. 

“After deliberations it was approved for August 18 in 2005. The then Prime Minister, Shaukat Aziz, declared August 18 as the National Plantation Day and he himself started the campaign by planting a Kachnar tree at the Prime Minister house. He had also made a policy to plant only indigenous trees,” she added.