Patna: The rural development department in the first 20 days of August has met nearly half of its annual target of planting 50 lakh saplings under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MNREGA).

The department, which implements the schemes under MNREGA in the state, has been able to plant 25,09,810 saplings from August 1 to 20.

"The department is now hoping to achieve double of the annual target of sapling planting work under MNREGA," rural development minister Shravan Kumar said.

The plantation work is generating employment under MNREGA in two ways.

First, employment generation takes place by involving people in this work and the second type of employment generation happens in the form of personnel who are deputed to nurture the planted saplings.

For every 200 saplings, two personnel are being deputed for nurturing them and this employment would be for a period of five years.

So far, 12,557 such units have been created for around 25 lakh saplings planted from August 1 to 20 and going by the pace of work it is expected that around 50,000 such units would be there if 1 crore saplings would be planted by the end of the fiscal giving employment opportunities for 1 lakh rural people.

An official in the rural development department said Begusarai district has fared the best by planting 5,88,600 saplings, which was 200 per cent of the target given to the district.

Samastipur (3,04,200), Gaya (2,24,200), Kaimur (1,26,200) and Purnea (1,22,800) are the other districts which have fared well in sapling planting work under the MNREGA.

The official said the districts had been directed to maintain the tempo of sapling planting work in the remaining days of the month as the rainy season - which is in full swing right now - is considered to be good for planting saplings.

"We are hoping that by end of this month, the number of planted saplings would cross the 4 million mark," added the official.