Azerbaijan, Baku, Aug. 27 / Trend M.Aliyev /
Azerbaijan has planted roughly 8.2 million trees over the past year, Azerbaijani Ecology and Natural Resources Minister Huseyngulu Bagirov said today in an interview with the ruling New Azerbaijan Party's official website.
"Large-scale ecological events have been carried out since 2009 upon President Ilham Aliyev's initiative," he said. "Three million trees have been planted in Baku and the surrounding areas. The ministry has planted around 5 million trees in total."
Bagirov added that the ministry has increased the territory of specially protected natural areas from 478,000 to 890,000 hectares since 2003. The country has eight national parks, 11 state reserves and 24 state conservation areas, which account for 10.3 percent of the total area of the country.
"The country held a number of serious measures to protect, restore and plant new forests," he said. "The ministry held support activities for seeding and natural regeneration over 7,750 hectares in 2002. The figure was 10,751 hectares in 2009. Reforestation activities have been carried out on 69,715 hectares in 2003-2009."
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