Celebrating International Day of Forests

It was a pleasure on Saturday morning to join the Minister of Industry and Primary Resources at an event to celebrate the International Day of Forests. Appropriately enough, the event was held in the beautiful setting of Bukit Shahbandar Forest Recreation Park.

After a ceremonial tree planting, the Minister launched a new free visitor guide book illustrating the 32 plant species to be found in the park. The Minister and guests then split up into teams for a spot of orienteering – a brisk walk along a trail with various checkpoints where we had to answer questions and perform simple tasks.

Back at the starting point, those still with enough energy joined an open air aerobics class. The rest of us enjoyed looking at the health products exhibition, with naturally grown and locally sourced items.

The morning activities brought home to me once again just how lucky we are to live in a country with a largely unspoiled environment. The park we were in is easily accessible to those of us living in Bandar Seri Begawan. You might be surprised to learn that forests cover 31% of the world’s total land area. But in the case of Brunei the figure is 75%.

The theme chosen by the UN for the 2015 International Day was forests and climate change. Forests and trees help to safeguard the planet’s biodiversity and act as a natural defence against climate change. According to UN figures, almost as much carbon is stored in forests (650 billion tonnes) as in the atmosphere (760 billion tonnes).