One lakh saplings, 90 % of them of willow and poplar species, shall be planted within the arid Ladakh area on May 17 to realize its 85-90 % survival fee, volunteers of the plantation drive mentioned on Sunday. A record-breaking 150,000 plus timber have already been planted within the Ladakh area and they’re thriving beneath the care of the Kung Fu nuns, led by Gyalwang Drukpa, the religious head of the 1,000-year-old Drukpa Order based mostly within the Himalayas.
To obtain the excessive survival fee of the sapling within the land of extremes, the place rainfall is uncommon and water, important for irrigating the farmlands and family chores, largely comes from melting snow, a solar-powered micro irrigation system has been put in with the native administration’s help.
The group non-religious plantation drive named `Trees for Life` is backed by a world community of non-profit organisations, Live to Love, whose volunteers, comprising Buddhist monks and nuns, twice broke the Guinness World Record for many timber planted concurrently.
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In 2012, Live to Love, based by the Gyalwang Drukpa, a recipient of the UN’s Millennium Development Goals Award for his humanitarian and environmental work, entered its title within the Guinness World Records historical past by breaking the document of the Philippines for “Most Trees Planted Simultaneously” by planting 99,103 Ladakhi willow saplings by involving 9,814 volunteers close to the world-famous Hemis monastery in lower than an hour. Previously, 9,033 volunteers of Live to Love planted 50,033 saplings in October 2010. The Philippines had planted 66,000 saplings inside an hour in January 2011.
A spokesperson for Live to Love informed IANS the plantation drive shall be carried out over an space of 60 acres in Liktsey, a small hamlet with some 30-odd mud-brick homes, the place villagers are largely rising barley and apricots, by involving some 5,000 volunteers, comprising authorities officers, leaders of varied faiths, locals moreover Kung Fu nuns and worldwide volunteers. They will plant saplings in specifically dug pits. A majority of the saplings are of Ladakhi willow and poplars.
“We are also planting fruit-bearing saplings mainly of apricot, apple, plum, walnut, and pears. To reduce the vulnerability of saplings to drought-like situations and improve their survival rate, a high-efficiency irrigation system has been set in place by the local administration. For this, water will be lifted from the nearby Indus River,” he added.
Ladakh is a chilly arid desert on excessive altitudes the place the annual precipitation is between 100 and 150 mm, insufficient to fulfill the typical moisture necessities of the vegetation.
According to Live to Love, the marketing campaign will inexperienced Ladakh`s barren lands, create pure watersheds, scale back erosion of soil, and mitigate devastating flash floods and landslides. Animals can have habitats and Ladakhi communities will have the ability to take pleasure in lush forests. Volunteers of Live to Love from Nepal and Bhutan will take part within the May 17 initiative.
Earlier, two mass plantation drives have been carried out in Changa village, almost 40 km away from Leh city, the place there’s a thick forest cowl now. In 2012, His Holiness the Gyalwang Drukpa personally joined the record-breaking try to encourage contributors. “It is totally a non-religious initiative to be carried out under the guidance of Gyalwa Dokhampa, who is from Bhutan,” mentioned the spokesperson.
The younger religious chief Gyalwa Dokhampa believes Buddhism is just not a faith however a approach to discover happiness. Based in Bhutan and Nepal, he teaches worldwide and brings a younger viewpoint to conventional teachings. As a religious trainer, he likes to work together with the youth on preserving the setting.
“During our walking experience in Ladakh in the Himalayas, we saw how much rubbish trekkers left behind which went into the water streams. These water streams are the source of about 30 to 40 percent of the world’s population. Our goal was to pick up all of the non-biodegradable garbage,” Gyalwa Dokhampa had informed IANS in certainly one of his latest interviews.
As a religious chief with a deep dedication to motion, Gyalwa Dokhampa, who spent his preliminary years in Darjeeling and shared his data with college students within the US, Europe, Vietnam, Malaysia, Hong Kong, and Singapore, has revealed quite a few books of curiosity.
