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The Homa Bay government in partnership with Sigona Thomas Foundation has kicked off a tree planting programme to increase the county’s forest cover.

The initiative seeks to mitigate the adverse impact of climate change orchestrated by environmental degradation factors such as deforestation.

The move is also in line with President William Ruto directive of growing at least 15 billion trees across the country by 2030.

Homa Bay with 3.18 percent of tree cover is listed among the counties with low forest cover in Kenya.

The County Director of Climate Change Roy Odongo and the foundation top official Kepha Otieno led the trees planting exercise at Ambassador Pamela Mboya Girls Secondary School in Suba North constituency yesterday.

Odongo said they expect such partnerships will increase the county’s forest cover as well as protect the environment. More than 500 trees were planted in the school.

“We ask Homa Bay residents to embrace planting of trees. This will not only help the county improve its forest cover to 10 percent but also protect the environment,” Odongo said.

The director said they plan to establish community tree nurseries to enable residents access seedlings. At least a tree nursery will be established in all the eight constituencies in the county. Planting of trees will be undertaken in gazetted government forests, hills, public lands and institutions such as schools and colleges.“Through this partnership, we target to plant more than 5million trees in the next five years. Growing of trees will help us mitigate the adverse effects of climate change,” he said.

Otieno urged members of the public to come together and support the programme by turning up whenever they are called up on.