Why Nigeria Should Plant One Billion Trees in 2024

Last week, my column, Prof. Brainy, in the Daily Trust newspaper proposed that Nigeria should beat Ethiopia’s record of planting 350 million trees in 12 hours. Before Ethiopia’s bold move, the record was held by India, which planted 50 million trees in 24 hours. Much of the credit for the feat goes to the Prime […]

Last week, my column, Prof. Brainy, in the Daily Trust newspaper proposed that Nigeria should beat Ethiopia’s record of planting 350 million trees in 12 hours.

Before Ethiopia’s bold move, the record was held by India, which planted 50 million trees in 24 hours.

Much of the credit for the feat goes to the Prime Minister, Abiy Ahmed, who mobilized the entire nation to undertake that climate action.

But immediately after the article was completed, I read that Ethiopia had broken its own record in July of 2023 when 34 million Ethiopians planted 560 million trees in one day!

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“They will say it’s impossible,” Mandela said, “until it’s done.”

We thank Ethiopians for helping us realize that it can be done. But now they must step aside to allow Nigeria, the continental leader (highest population, biggest GDP), to shatter its record and set a new one.

How many trees should Nigeria plant in a day?

Last week, it was suggested that Nigeria should plant 400 million trees (two per citizen) in 12 hours because we only knew about the 350 million trees Ethiopia planted in August 2019. But now that we know better, how many trees should we plant?

Some Nigerians said that to beat Ethiopia’s 560 million trees record, Nigeria should plant nothing less than one billion trees. This is a huge number and appears impossible, but let’s break that down.

Take Ethiopia’s example:

“Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed said 34 million Ethiopians,” a report said, “came out on Monday to plant trees in over 300,000 hectares of land nationwide.”

If 34 million people planted 560 million trees, that’s 16 trees per person. This is very doable.

Let’s assume that in our case, every person will plant 20 trees. To plant one billion trees, we will need 50 million Nigerians. If Ethiopia, with a total population of 120 million (World Bank, 2021), can mobilize 34 million people (25% of the general population), we should be able to mobilize 50 million (which is also a quarter of our population).

Indeed, if we can get 1 million people to plant 1,000 trees, we would’ve reached our goal. Or 1,000 entities to plant 1 million trees. That is, we can also get there if all the 774 local government areas and 200 companies plant one million trees each. 

Already, we have people who have already pledged a thousand trees or more to our 200MillionTrees initiative. Starting from 2023, 200MillionTrees wanted to plant one tree for every Nigerian (hence the name 200MillionTrees). But we wanted to achieve this in 10 years.

If we’re able to plant one billion trees in 2023, however, we would also have achieved what we intended to do in 10 years.

So if we move those who have pledged their support for our 200 million trees project to the one billion trees project, that will give us a head start and encourage others. We’ll simply plant all on a day in July of 2023.

For instance, Abubakar Suleiman, CEO of Sterling Bank Ibraheem Dooba 0500876083 Bank and Chairman of the advisory board of 200MillionTrees, has pledged to plant trees on 50 acres of land in Niger State. That’s at least 20,000 trees.

Another member of the advisory board and the CEO of FlintAero Limited, Captain Abdullahi Mohammed Muye, has entered into an agreement with us to plant a tree for every passenger his planes carry. We need similar gestures from other airlines.

Dr. Moayad of Zuma Rock Resort is planting 6,000 trees. The following are planting 1,000 trees each: Usman Mohammed Umar (executive director, Mainstream Energy), Dr. Orode Doherty (wife of the popular Funso Doherty, a 2023 gubernatorial candidate in Lagos State), Suleiman Umar (commissioner of works Niger State), Mustapha Ndajiwo (commissioner of budget and planning of Niger State), Yusuf Baffa (Pension Commission), and many others who have pledged and donated hundreds of trees. A comprehensive list will be published soon.

Schools at all levels should plant trees according to their student populations, and hotels according to the number of their guests in a year. Also, we need banks and telecom companies to plant trees for every customer.

Additionally, we need NGOs, embassies and all government agencies and ministries to plant trees for every staff member.

And finally, we need every worshipper in mosques and churches to plant a tree.

Where will the planting be done?

The interesting thing is that the trees you plant are yours. Therefore, they can be planted in houses, private farms, offices, schools, mosques, churches, local government secretariats, government houses, and public parks.

But if you lack a place to plant, simply give them to us, and we will plant them in schools and worship centers on our list.

Why July?

By July, the rains have settled, and it takes another five months before the dry season begins (in November) in many parts of Nigeria.

Benefits of Planting Trees

We’re not planting trees just to set a record. Nigeria has lost 60% of its forest cover. Floods become more devastating because of this. It also makes our land less fertile. But planting trees, especially forests, can stabilize our rainfall, improve soils, and reduce urban temperatures.

Mentioning Ethiopia and the need to break their record only infuses fun and gamification into the adventure.

What will the trees cost?

There’s an expensive way and a cheap way. Buying quality fruit tree saplings from our nurseries ranges from 1,000 to 20,000 naira depending on tree varieties. Accordingly, planting 1 billion trees at N1,000 will cost N1 trillion. Even if it’s expensive, buying from our local nurseries is encouraged because it will energize our economy.

A cheaper way, if one is planting many trees, is to start from a nursery. I’ve a forester who does a 250,000 seedlings nursery at N20 million – including installing a borehole and the whole shebang. This brings the cost of each tree down to N80 and the entire one billion trees to N80 billion.

The good thing is that not one person is bearing the cost. For the person planting 100 trees from their own nursery, the cost is only N8,000.

In sum, if Ethiopia can do it, Nigeria can do it better. It’s also a project that can unite us all because no one is against tree planting. While I concede that planting trees now doesn’t solve the entire climate crisis, I dare anyone to imagine a world without trees. Seriously, imagine that world!