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By Taziz Hasairi.
Tripoli, 30 January 2014:
More than 500 saplings were planted around the campus of Tripoli University as a part of . . .[restrict]a tree-planting campaign this week.
The event was attended by hundreds of students from all university departments, some local high school students, Head of Tripoli Local Council Sadat Elbadri, and a representative from the Friends of Trees organisation, which is under the Ministry of Agriculture.
Just 1.5 percent of Libya is forested, an improvement on the 500,000-600,000 hectares of trees a few years ago, according to a lecturer from the Department of Forests and Grasslands in the university’s Agriculture Department, Ibrahim Shkab. This was already a boost from 2006, when this had been reduced to 2 percent as 303,000 hectares across Libya, he said.
Libya ranked far behind other countries with its number of trees, Shkab said, adding that only a low percentage of these trees were indigenous species.
Elbadri thanked everyone involved in the event and told the students present that they should study hard because they would be the columns upon which Libya would rest on the future.
A young member of the Friends of Trees Club, 12 year-old Abud Al-Muhaimen said he thought that planting trees was one of the more important things because of the contribution this would make to the country having a better and healthier environment. [/restrict]
