2021-11-26

Every living thing depends on water for life and health. But the changing climatic patterns resulting due to urbanization and industrialization has led to the depletion of the water table and loss of biodiversity. Planting trees along the roadside can make significant improvements in the quality of the environment and can protect key natural resources. These trees will also help in trapping the dust, reduce air pollution and run-off, which reduces the problems like gully formation, erosion, waterlogging, etc. Several studies indicate that the benefits accumulated from roadside tree planting include better soil formation by shedding dead leaves, increased water quality by reducing sediment flow, reduced erosion, road beautification, flood control as the trees slow and absorb road runoff, wind-breaking, providing important pollinator habitats, improving people's health, and protecting crops (Steenbergen et al., 2019; Perez et al., 2016).

TIES in association with Social Forestry Department, Kottayam, and NSS Unit, St. Mary’s College, Manaracad are jointly implementing a project named “ Thanal ” which aims to plant avenue trees along state highways, bypasses, etc. The reason why the project initially targets SH’s and bypasses is that the dust generated by the many vehicles traversing these roads is quite alarming and many of our roads are now worn-out and partially paved. Thus by planting trees we are planning to avert major issues like soil erosion, runoff, particulate matter, air pollution, etc.

On November 29, 2021, Honourable Kottayam District collector P K Jayashree, IAS will inaugurate the project at Naalumanikkattu.

“ Avenues for nature restoration”