President Ruto Rallies Kenyans to Plant Five Billion Trees to Combat Climate Change

President Ruto has announced his administration’s plan to plant at least five billion trees as part of the efforts to combat drought and climate change.

To achieve this, the president urged every Kenyan to plant at least 100 trees, attributing the current drought, the worst in four decades, to climate change.
 
“As a country, we have made a policy change decision that we must plant at least five billion trees. Every Kenyan must plant at least 100 trees. Either in your compound, in your farm or in any other place you find. That is the surest way for us to turn around the climate so that we can have water, grow crops, do dams, agro-processing and make sure we have prosperity,” said Ruto.

He added: “As a country, we must realize that as a member of the global community we have a challenge of climate right here with us. We have farming, we have the most severe drought in 40 years confirming that we are already suffering the effects of climate change.”

The president was speaking in Kirinyaga County where he officially commissioned the discharge of water from the newly constructed Thiba Dam to rice farms.

The dam, which has a capacity of 15.6 million cubic meters, was built at a cost of Sh7.8 billion and is expected to increase the production of rice in the area from the current 25,000 to 35,000 acres.

President Ruto said the dam will help to increase rice production in the Mwea irrigation scheme from 114,000 metric tonnes to 200,000 metric tonnes.