Begum Khaleda Zia, speaking in Dhaka on World Environment Day, urged all families to plant 10 timber, fruit-bearing and medicinal plants, including five neem trees each.

She also inaugurated the National Tree Plantation Movement and Tree Fair-2006 and presented the “Prime Minister’s National Award for the Tree Plantation-2005”.

The prime minister said the government had transformed tree plantation into a social movement, with new forests including 153,000ha of mangrove trees in the coastal zone and 25,000ha created under the social forestry programme.