The country that set the record to plant more than 350 million trees in 12 hours

A tree-planting marathon can give Ethiopia a new world record. According to the authorities, hundreds of millions of trees have been planted all over the country in just 12 hours, in order to combat deforestation.

Ethiopian authorities say they have reached a record that could bring great environmental benefits to the country.

This Monday, they planted more than
350 million trees Getahun Mekuria, Ethiopia's Minister of Innovation and Technology, reported in just 12 hours.

The marathon day was held in more than 1,000 regions of the country and the initiative says it is a
New world record.

The goal of the project is to plant 4,000 million trees

The current record of planting trees in one day belongs to India, where 800,000 volunteers planted more than 50 million trees in 2016.

This mbadive seeding was part of a government project called
Green Legacy Initiative, which aims to fight
"the terrifying environmental degradation" that the country undergoes.

United Nations support

The seedlings were sown by
volunteers According to Kalkidan Yibeltal, a BBC journalist in Addis Ababa, teams of officials were in charge of counting.

Some public offices
were closed allow the participation of officials.

The initiative has also benefited from the support of the United Nations and embbadies of some Ethiopian countries.

With 103 million inhabitants, Ethiopia is the second most populous country in Africa after Nigeria.

The campaign included videos broadcast on state media inviting people to plant trees and take care of them, says Yibeltal.

The purpose of the project is to plant
4,000 million trees.

Deforestation and drought

According to United Nations data, at the beginning of the twentieth century, Ethiopian forests occupied a large
35% of the national territory, but this figure dropped to just over 4% in the 2000s.

With
103 million inhabitants, is the second most populous country in Africa after Nigeria.

Ethiopia is vulnerable to disasters caused by climate change, particularly droughts, which have intensified in recent years and affect millions of people.

According to the United Nations, these droughts are causing difficulties in obtaining water and food, as well as the internal displacement of some 3 million people.

The plantation project is led by Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, who shared the photos of the day.

Abiy's critics say the president is using the campaign to distract citizens from the challenges his government is facing, including ethnic conflicts that have forced nearly 2.5 million people to leave their homes.