Kenyans on Tuesday celebrated the African Civil Service Day with various activities which culminated in tree planting to help the country achieve the 10 percent forest cover.
While addressing the members of public during a tree planting exercise at Irangi Forest Station in Embu, Prof. Japhet Ntiba, the Principal Secretary in the State Department of Fisheries said tree planting should be embraced by all for all are connected with trees.
Prof. Ntiba noted that there is great threat to forest cover due to a surge in population with probability of trees being destroyed leading to desertification.
He further noted that human activities that lead to destruction of trees affect the ecosystem, including having adverse effects on marine life which bounce back to human beings.
Elsewhere, over 3000 trees were planted in Nyamira County to mark Africa’s Public Service week, a ceremony that was held at Ekerubo Gietai Technical Training Institute (TTI) grounds in Nyamira North Sub County where the County Commissioner (CC), Amos Mariba urged the residents to embrace tree planting during this rainy season in the region to increase forest cover.
He also asked the public to give priority to fruit trees for food and wood provision.
“Today we are celebrating the Africa Public Service week as a gesture of solidarity to other public service providers in Africa, Kenya chose to plant all over the Country. This move will increase the vegetation and forest cover that has been greatly threatened by human action of deforestation.” The commissioner said.
In Narok, the Deputy County Commissioner, Mutuku Mwenga asked the public servants to act as role models in planting trees in their office and home premises in a bid to achieve the 10 percent mark set by the government.
Mwenga reiterated that the Department of Gender will collaborate with the department of forest to plant more trees in the county.
“We will be planting both exotic and indigenous trees that do well in this area. Exotic trees take only five years to mature while indigenous trees take over 25 years to mature,” said Mwenga.
Some of the types of trees planting during the event, included Jacaranda, bamboo, sandalwood and fruit trees like avocado, mango and tree tomato.
He called on the public servants to uphold the dignity of the citizens as they serve because citizens are entitled to efficient and responsive service delivery.
The Nyamira County Conservator, Mark Ooko clarified that the programme of cutting down eucalyptus trees along river banks and those planted around water sources is still ongoing the reason why we are encouraging people to plant water friendly trees which will conserve the water sources of this very precious commodity.
By Deborah Bochere/Dan Nyamanga
