North Korea called on its people to actively take part in springtime tree planting as the country marked Tree Planting Day — North Korea’s equivalent of Arbor Day — on Tuesday.
A reporting partner in North Pyongan Province told Daily NK on Monday that the authorities issued an order for people to take part in springtime tree planting “in a responsible way based on prior organized activities such as sapling preparation” to mark Tree Planting Day.
The order emphasized the importance of tree planting for preventing natural disasters and restoring forests.
Ahead of Tree Planting Day, North Korean authorities ordered organized efforts to bring everyone “together as one” for springtime tree planting through “organic cooperation” between provincial planning, land management, urban management, construction and transportation departments, the reporting partner said.
In particular, North Korea called on officials to persuade and educate people to take part in tree planting efforts with a sense of patriotism, calling springtime tree planting an “important activity to make the nation’s mountains and fields green,” and stressed that people should contribute to national development by properly planting trees, even if they just plant one tree.
In response, North Pyongan Province authorities convened a meeting of department heads earlier this month and made a special plea to mobilize workers, housewives and even students throughout the province to ensure there is enough saplings on Tree Planting Day so that people can plant trees on that day.
Moreover, forestry officials called on people to properly plant their trees, “even if only a single sapling,” teaching them tree planting regulations such as how deep holes need to be dug and how far apart the trees should be.
Authorities in North Pyongan Province also called on people to take care of their trees after Tree Planting Day, noting the importance of ensuring the trees have good survival rates.
Daily NK’s reporting partner said officials were ordered to find out how many trees planted last year are still alive and report their findings.
North Pyongan Province authorities also said it would tabulate morning and afternoon public participation in Tree Planting Day activities and review how the planted acreage and results stack up against planned targets.
It also said it would use the opportunity to review the survival rate of trees planted last year.
The reporting partner said saplings were distributed to all agencies and enterprises in North Pyongan Province, but with saplings in short supply this year, these organizations have been ordered to secure saplings on their own.
“For the shortfall, they have to either gather money to buy saplings or go deep into the mountains and pull them out of the ground, so officials at agencies and enterprises are unhappy about the situation,” he said.
The Standing Committee of the Supreme People’s Assembly issued an ordinance on Oct. 25 of last year changing Tree Planting Day from Mar. 2 to Mar. 14.
The ordinance explained that the date is a “historic day” when Kim Il Sung handed down instructions on Mar. 14, 1952, calling for a pan-national effort to restore forests destroyed by US bombings during the Korean War, and that the date change aimed to glorify Kim’s achievement of “lighting the first signal fire of forestry restoration.”
Translated by David Black. Edited by Robert Lauler.
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