Plants such as neem (in picture) will be in focus during this year’s plantation drive. Picture by Ashwinee Pati

Bhubaneswar, May 11: The stretch of National Highway-5 from Baramunda to Rasulgarh will soon look greener as the state forest and environment department has decided to take up a coordinated plantation drive in many areas of the capital, including the major road.

The department plans to plant about 3.06 lakh saplings in a coordinated plantation drive.

The emphasis will be on planting mainly indigenous varieties such as neem, ficus, baul, chhatian, jamun, karanja, pista, patuli, sunari and hatiphal trees.

“We have also been asked to include flowering trees such as sunari (Cassia fistula) which has beautiful golden-yellow flowers. On many occasions, the flowers even dominate the leaves of a sunari tree. The plant is also stronger than the gold mohur varieties that were preferred earlier. This year, we will chose a single avenue for a particular flowering plant species so that in the next flowering season, the entire avenue will don a particular colour,” said divisional forest officer of city forest division Jayanta Dash.

However, a senior forest official said neem plantation would be especially preferred on major roads (width more than 30 feet) as the tree has got many medicinal properties, including purifying the air.

Dash said while the city forest division would have its share to take up plantation of 47,000 saplings, the Odisha Forest Development Corporation (OFDC) would plant 1.7 lakh, the Chandaka Dampara Wildlife Sanctuary 50,000, the Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation 7,000 and the Bhubaneswar Development Authority 8,000. Various industrial companies in and around the capital would plant the remaining 24,000 trees.

Admitting that getting land had become a problem for the plantation activity and especially in creating green belts around the city, another forest official said that the city management group, headed by special secretary of general administration department U.N. Behera, had taken steps to identify more lands for the ongoing plantation initiative.

“A 119-acre forestland has been identified at Gothapatna, while seven acres near Jokalandi and a 15-acre land near Jayadev Vihar will also be taken up for scientific plantation with adequate water provision through drip irrigation. The state forest and environment department has already raised a forest patch at Kalinga Vihar area and a medicinal plant garden at Patrapada,” said an official.