Bonayan, a private-sector-supported sapling distribution programme, has handed out more than 130 million (13 crore) fruit, timber and medicinal tree seedlings free of charge across Bangladesh over the past 46 years, and plans to distribute a further 5 million (50 lakh) nationwide this year. With cyclones, floods and heatwaves growing more frequent, the programme is framed around restoring the environment, expanding green cover and conserving biodiversity, those involved say.

Launched in 1980, Bonayan now works through 19 nurseries around the country, which raise seedlings of species suited to local conditions and soils. One of its defining features is a 70:30 species mix: fast-growing timber species alongside native and medicinal trees.

Seedlings are distributed and planted in a planned way along roadsides, at social and public gathering places, and in ecologically important or sensitive areas. Over 46 years the programme has worked with farmers, local communities, government institutions and a range of civic and social organisations, and has established 119 medicinal plant gardens intended to reacquaint local people with traditional medicinal species.

Bonayan has received national and international recognition for its long-running environmental work, including the Prime Minister's National Award for tree planting on five occasions.

Programme spokesperson Ahmed Raihan Ahsanullah said 46 years of work was both a significant achievement and a continuing responsibility, and that as the effects of climate change intensify, initiatives that encourage people to plant trees matter more than ever. This year's 5 million saplings, he said, would help raise the country's tree-to-land ratio and carry forward the effort to build a greener, more climate-resilient Bangladesh.

For farm households, fruit and medicinal trees around homesteads and along village roads are a source of extra income and nutrition, and wider green cover gives field crops some shelter from climate shocks — which is where a planting programme touches agriculture. The report is from Arthosuchak, by Masum Rahman.

Source: Arthosuchak