User:Sulaiman.lodhi3/sandbox

Clifton Urban Forest Karachi Formerly working with the UNDP Global Environmental Finance (UNDP-GEF) Unit, Mr Lohar opted for early retirement. From his provident fund and pension, he managed to set up a plant nursery in Hyderabad. “It was there that I managed to ready one million saplings of peelu trees. We wanted to plant these trees, but where? The Navy offered us land at Sandspit, Murtaza Wahab also got in touch about letting us plant our trees in a park but we needed more space for so many trees. That’s how we got this place,” he said.

Of course, things are never as simple as they sound. Once Mr Lohar and his friends were given the land, they could not go about planting the trees on it right away. “We ran into loads of debris and once we started cleaning, we got to digging way deep to get out all the plastic bags, animal carcasses, etc. But while digging out the debris, we were also creating debris mountains in front of the sea. Now those very hills are serving as shields for the saplings against the salt spray from the sea,” he pointed out.

‘We counted 42 different bird species found here; the forest will provide them a nice natural habitat’

“Cleaning up the land has also made us broke. But we are determined,” he added. Some of the saplings are sprouting fresh leaves, some new flowers. Mr Lohar ran around them like a gleeful child. “Look at the little leaves. Did you see that little flower bud?” he asks happily.

“Urban forests, planted using the Miyawaki method, are the best solution to Karachi’s heatwave and other environmental issues. Earlier, in our surveys of this place, we counted 42 different bird species that are found here. The forest will provide them a nice natural habitat,” he said. “Also we noticed three types of lizards here. Two we found in our survey and the third came to meet us itself,” Mr Lohar laughs. “One of our guards found it on his lap.”