VietNamNet -  A national tree-planting campaign was launched by President Tran Duc Luong yesterday in commemoration of President Ho Chi Minh's efforts to expand Vietnam's forests.

President Tran Duc Luong tends to a tree at the historical site of Dinh Hoa Resistance Base in Thai Nguyen Province as part of a new national tree-planting campaign.

The new environmental campaign echoes President Ho Chi Minh's tree-planting movement of 1960. President Luong launched the new tree-planting campaign at the historical site of Dinh Hoa Resistance Base, the headquarters of the Party and Vietnamese Resistance Government from 1946 to 1954 in Thai Nguyen Province.

At the launching ceremony, President Luong said President Ho Chi Minh's initial tree-planting movement had elevated the traditional Vietnamese pursuit of growing trees to an important national activity.

Mr Luong appealed to Party committees, local authorities and people across the nation to get involved in the movement that aimed at extending Vietnam's forest cover while also making forestry a key industry.

"Forests are an important part of life not only in Thai Nguyen Province but across the entire nation," said Luong.

"On the global scale, the loss of trees and forests is becoming so severe that it threatens human life.

"Therefore, Ho Chi Minh's appeal on expanding forested areas and planting trees in Spring is an extremely worthy cause."

President Luong said the tree-planting campaign should be further developed in co-ordination with plans on forest protection and management in order to increase forest coverage as quickly as possible.

Forests in Dinh Hoa have contributed to the region's socio-economic development and to programmes aimed at hunger eradication and poverty reduction in the area.

President Luong continued his work in Thai Nguyen Province yesterday at talks with the province's Party Central Committee, local government, organisations and wider community.

He asked the local authority to pay attention to improving the living conditions of its resident, especially those living in the old revolutionary base.

The president also offered suggestions on realising the province's potential for developing its agriculture in combination with plans to boost industrialisation and join the Northern Key Economic Region.

According to a report by the Ministry of Agricultural and Rural Development, about 37.5% of Vietnam is covered by forests.

Last year, new forests were planted across a total of 161,000ha, while 622,000ha of old forest areas were regrown. About 2,000,000ha of forest were allotted to people under protection contracts and 250mil trees, scattered across the country, were planted by people.

However, forest protection and expansion activities were still insufficient. Forest fire, deforestation, encroachment upon forest areas and illegal forestry have been rampant.

This year, the agricultural sector would focus on developing forests for raw materials while placing a priority on the application of advanced technology in forestry. Forestry programmes would also be extended to more communes while investment in the sector's forest protection and afforestation workforce would be increased.

Along Thai Nguyen, many other provinces across the nation were also involved in planting trees during the start of year.

To prepare for the planting of 1,800ha of protective forests this year, the northern mountain province of Bac Can has begun moving 3.4mil seedlings to areas designed for afforestation.

The province aims to increase its forest coverage from 53 to 58% by 2010.

Yesterday, 10 districts and towns in the northern province of Hung Yen launched a forest planting festival.

The province plans to grow 400,000 trees - with a majority being economically viable trees such as litchis, longan and trees suitable for timber.

The province's farmers were told to replace low quality and old seedlings with speciality fruit trees like Vinh Orange from Nghe An central province and Phu Dien grapefruit from Hanoi.

Districts on the edge of the Hong (Red) and Luoc rivers also planted bamboo to protect dykes from erosion and water damage.