Mother Nature would have been proud of students from Keti Bundar, and Jhaloo and Juho: more than 100 boys and girls raced to plant as many saplings as they could on Sunday at Keti Bandar in an event organised by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN)-Pakistan in connection with the World Environment Day.
The event was organised in collaboration with the Sindh Coastal Community Development Project (SCCDP), that is being executed by the Sindh Coastal Development Authority (SCDA). Other partners include the Sindh Forest Department and United Welfare Organisation, a local CBO from Keti Bandar. The purpose of the event was to highlight the significance of the World Environment Day and International Year of Forests, and to create community awareness on the importance of mangrove forest ecosystem.
Students from primary and high schools from Keti Bandar, as well as those from the middle schools of Jhaloo and Juho participated in the mangrove planting competition. Government Middle School Jhaloo won the event by planting 630 mangrove saplings within the allotted time. Keti Bundar High School stood in second place.
The competition was followed by an awards distribution ceremony. The chief guest, SCCDP Deputy Project Director Aftab Ahmad Abro, awarded shields to the teams. Appreciating the efforts of students who participated in the mangrove planting competition, Abro said that such activities are very important for creating awareness. He also lauded IUCN-Pakistan’s role in organising the World Environment Day at Keti Bandar, and stressed that such events needed to be organised at community level on a regular basis.
NRM coordinator of IUCN-Pakistan, Ghulam Qadir Shah, highlighted the significance of the World Environment Day and the importance of forests to the global environment and local economy. He admired the students and their teachers for the passion with which they planted mangroves, and explained that mangroves are a blessing of nature. Not only do they act as breeding ground for fish and shrimp, they also act as a barrier against natural disasters such as tsunamis, cyclones and storms.
SCCDP Community Development Deputy Director Akhar Hussain Samoo also highlighted coastal communities’ role in conservation of natural resources.
