By Ali Imran
RAWALPINDI: Special Assistant to the Prime Minister (SAPM) on Climate Change, Malik Amin Aslam said over 600 million saplings would be planted during spring plantation campaign this year.
He said the government had set a plantation target of one billion trees for all the provinces this year. The SAPM said directives had been issued by the government that no agricultural land could be converted into housing societies. Earlier, the approval for establishing a housing society was given at commissioner level but now, the provincial cabinet would approve new housing projects. The step had been taken to make the approval to convert agricultural land for housing project, a difficult task so that the agricultural land could be protected, he added. He said there was no master plan for any city. After 1960, no master plan was formulated for any city. On the directives of the Prime Minister, the master plans of 80 cities were being devised which would be finalized within five to six months, he added. The master plans would help contain the limits of the cities and there would be no expansion of the cities beyond their limits. The government was encouraging the construction vertically to save agricultural land, he said. About installation of sewerage plants and plantation by the housing societies he said, “The government is going to issue an order for environmental audit of all the housing societies and strict action would be taken against those violating the rules.”
