Ethiopian Prime-Minister Abiy Ahmed has launched a massive tree planting campaign on Monday.
The government wants to plant 500 million seedlings in a day to break world record for largest tree-planting exercise in a day.
Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and his wife Zinash Tayachew officially launched the programme called Green Legacy in the capital Addis Ababa starting with planting apple seedlings.
Citizens are expected to follow suit and by the end of the day, the authorities hope 500 million trees would be planted. Office of the Prime Minister has shared pictures of the launch with people living with disabilities participating.
Ethiopia is targeting to break its record for planting the highest number of trees in a day as part of its campaign to counter the effects of deforestation and climate change.
World record
It set the record in July 2019 by planting 353 million trees in just 12 hours, according to officials, and hopes to surpass the mark on Monday.
"Our goal is to break our record!" Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed tweeted.
"Our competition is with ourselves. We believe that regions, zones, districts and villages will break their own records by planting more than last year. Each of us has to break our own records," he added.
Guinness World Records has yet to verify the record by Ethiopia.
The current world record of trees planted in a day is held by India after more than 800,000 people planted 50 million trees in 2016 in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh.
Ethiopia's campaign aims to restore the country’s forest cover which has declined from 35% of total land at the end of the 19th century to nearly 4% in the 2000s, according to the UN.
