Neem Foundation to plant ten crore Neem trees

Bangalore, Jun 5 (UNI) The Neem Foundation promoting the neem tree as a sustainable solution to global ecological health concerns, has embarked on 'Greening India with Neem' programme with an objective of planting ten crore neem trees across the country.

Speaking on the occasion of World Environment Day, Foundation Chairman R C Saxena announced that the fifth 'World Neem Conference' would be held in Coimbatore from November 21-24. "This Conference would act as a platform for stakeholders to evaluate technologies based on Neem that have potential of uplifting and enhancing quality of life," he added.

Over 400 experts would take part in the Conference.

He said neem was considered as 'Free and Noble tree of India'. It was ecologically very special and can tolerate very high levels of pollution. It has been probed that neem is the best shield to check the urban pollution in industrial locations. It had high efficiently of CO2 fixation with its thick foliage canopy and leaf surface area.

He said every part of neem tree was packed with anti-bacterial, anti-fungal, anti-viral, anti-histamine, anti-septic and immune stimulating compounds for treating hundreds of maladies. It was also found useful in agriculture, animal health, human health, cosmetics and even pet care. "Neem is non violent and it does not kill or have adverse affects like pesticides," he added.

He said Greening India with Neem programme envisages planting of ten crore neem trees in a span of ten years. India had an estimated 20 million neem trees with an equation of one tree for every 50 people. The Foundation want to put to use more than 100 million hectares of barren, unproductive and degraded wasteland in the country by planting neem trees. The net worth neem trees was enaramous as it can produce useful products worth 30,000 US Dollars in its lifespan of 250 to 300 years, he added.

The Neem Foundation in an ambitious project had approached the National Highway Authority of India to plant neem trees along the 16,000 km of national highways on both sides of the road. "This can give us 120 billion dollars worth of returns," Dr Saxena added.

Godrej Agrovet Vice President B N Vyas advocated use of neem in agriculture to combat air and ground water pollution. "Simple but effective technologies like coating urea with neem can bring tremendous benefits in agriculture as it can help control air and ground water pollution that pose serious threat to mankind and also enhance the utilisation of Urea," he said.

"Indian farmer uses 20 million tones of urea. 50 per cent of this was leached as nitrate into ground water, while nitrous oxide is released to the atmosphere. Coating of neem with urea can drastically bring down the ecologically disastrous effects of chemical fertilisers," he said.

UNI