Online effort fetches over 1 lakh trees for wildlife areas in

Story/place-Udaipur,
PTI | 12:05 PM,May 08,2011
Yash Shethia, Team leader of FES working around Kumbhalgarh Sanctuary in Udaipur says it is a long-term initiative that aims at regeneration of local forest and communities living there."We work with local communities to have a good forest.Kumbhalgarh forest protects eastern part of Rajasthan from desertification. So, this effort has implications beyond wildlife also," says Shethia.Local types of tress are mainly planted in these areas, apart from economically viable options like bamboo, which can also be used in building houses by locals.The idea began when in June 2010, Pradip Shah, founder of CRISIL, a credit rating agency, was gifted a garden of 100 trees planted in his honour in Israel for technical assistance that he provided to a rating agency there."Tree planting creates low-skill jobs, and benefits current and future generations, has a direct impact on carbon reduction, restoring forests, improving wildlife habitats, and upgrading water catchment areas, and offer flowers, fruit fodder and fuel for local communities and all living creatures," says Shah.The philosophy is to help each interested individual to offset carbon emissions caused by him and his family or friends by using electricity, air-conditioners, aeroplanes etc. The cost of planting a tree is Rs 50."The per capita carbon emission in India is currently around 1.2 tonnes per annum, expected to rise to 2-2.5 tonnes by 2020 and 3-3.5 tonnes by 2030. A large tree inhales 20.3 kgs of carbon-dioxide in a year and exhales enough oxygen for a family of four for a year," says Shah.People have the option on the website to calculate the amount of carbon emitted due to them and they can also calculate the number of trees needed to offset this emission.The United Nations Environment Program has recognised efforts of Grow-Trees.com and has declared it as official partner in its 'Billion Tree Campaign'.For the future, says Shah, the target is to plant ten lakh trees and increase the plantations in cities by partnering with schools and colleges there.

Source-ibnlive.in.com
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