Tanzanian authorities on Thursday launched a tree planting campaign that will see each of the country's 14.1 million students planting a tree annually.

Launching the campaign in the capital Dodoma, Minister of State in the Vice-President's Office responsible for Environment Selemani Jafo said the campaign will involve students from primary schools, secondary schools to high learning institutions.

"The objective of the campaign is to re-green the country and to mitigate against climate change," said Jafo when he addressed students from schools and high learning institutions based in the Dodoma region.

Jafo said the tree planting campaign for students was also aimed at encouraging the students to cultivate a culture of protecting the environment.

"We are witnesses to dry spells that have affected farming and livestock keeping across the country. We are witnesses to erratic rainfall that has also affected farming," said Jafo, adding that all these were the impacts of climate change.

He said the newly launched tree planting campaign will support other tree planting campaigns that are aimed at saving the country from deforestation.

According to statistics, Tanzania has an annual deforestation rate of about 1 percent, around 400,000 hectares.

(Cover image is via CFP)

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