President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has declared that Monday 11th November is to be National Forestation Day.
Millions of people will plant millions of saplings in what will be a record-breaking campaign.
Erdogan said that “we have no doubt every single one of our citizens will volunteer for the event that will set a new record with 11 million saplings to be planted in three hours across 2,023 points in our 81 provinces”. He continued by saying that “we have decided to declare Nov 11 National Forestation Day to leave a greener, healthier country to future generations and to also protect and better manage our forests that play key roles economically, ecologically and sociologically”.
The mass tree planting event made headlines in July when Erdogan responded to Abdullah Enes Sahin, an environmental activist, who appealed to state officials to select a specific day for planting trees. Originally it was planned to plant 3 million saplings, however; due to the interest from citizens, this number quickly grew.
The planting events will be at the same time with particular attention being paid in Izmir and Mugla provinces where fires have damaged hundreds of hectares of forests.
