Tree Planting & Soil Digging Activity

By: Billah H.

A job well done to the members of UBD Volunteering and Charity Club (UVC) for their involvement in the recent tree planting and soil digging activity organised jointly by UBD Estate and Health, Security and Environment Exco (MPP). It was held to prepare for the "Plant Your Own Tree" event, a part of the ongoing Green Project in conjunction with Pesta Convo 2009, which will commence officially on Wednesday, October 28th.

Photo below shows UVC members gathering before the digging activity starts

Some personnels from the Department of Forestry also came to assist with the soil digging, along with the facilitators of the Green Project, Dr Kushan Tenakoon from Faculty of Science and Dr Kamariah Abu Salim, the Head of Kuala Belalong Field Studies Centre (KBFSC).

Head of Logistics, Husrin (R) supervising one of the members to dig the soil

Miss Maudena, the assistant registrar of the UBD Estate, said that about 60 trees are going to be planted during the "Plant Your Own Tree" event this Wednesday while 60 or more tree saplings will be further collected for the second cycle of workshop. The event is more or less similar to that of the "adopt a tree" programme whereby the tree adopters are welcome to take care of the trees that they bought.

'Waiting to be planted by their adopters'
Photo shows the readily dug soil for the "Plant Your Own Tree" event

Besides soil digging, UVC members were also asked to pull out the seedlings of Acacia trees which have grown numerously after the forest fire. According to Dr Kamariah, the Acacia trees are from Australia and they are invasive species to the local trees. The Acacias were originally brought to Brunei in the early 50s and 60s in order to combat the soil erosion which was problematic at that time. Especially in Kerangas forest, they out compete the local species in terms of nutrients and water supply hence diminishing the number of local Kerangas species.

The activity ended with a small refreshments prepared by the UBD Estate.