Desertification is a major issue
throughout Africa, but there’s a simple way to stop the spread of deserts into
fertile land: planting forests. The problem is that in the regions hardest hit
by the phenomenon, there simply isn’t enough clean water to properly nurture
the trees and keep them healthy. German scientists have collaborated with the
Egyptian government to create a natural miracle by using ingenuity assisted by
biology, the Serapium Forest in the middle of the desert, just two hours from
Cairo. It comprises of about 494 acres (about 200 hectares) of both native and
non-native trees like eucalyptus and mahogany, thriving regardless of the dry
land and shortage of rain. Therefore, the secret is an irrigation system that
crosses liquid nourishment to the trees via hose pipes, sourcing water from a
adjacent sewage treatment plant.
Moreover, mechanical filters
strain dirt and garbage from the wastewater, and then extra oxygen and microbes
break down the enduring organic matter. Hence, to complete purification would
be too expensive; so, some pollutants are left behind, with phosphates and
nitrates. Though unamenable to the irrigation of eatable plants like fruits and
vegetables, the lasting compounds make a rich fertilizer for trees to create
firewood. In fact, the mix mimics that included in numerous commercial
fertilizers.
Moreover, there’re other inherent
ways that the environment supports flourishing plant life, too. Contrasting the
scientists’ local German climate, Egypt doesn’t have severe, cold winters. The
strong sunlight paired with the nutrient-infused water mean that eucalyptus
grows four times faster here than it does in European country Germany. Further,
the plantations deliver much-needed jobs for those tending to the trees, which
take as few as 15 years to be ready for harvesting, as long as 350 cubic meters
of wood per hectare a resource that would otherwise have to be imported. Hence,
if satisfactory funding were acquired, 650,000 more hectares of desert terrain
could be used for further wood production, and the similar process has enormous
potential to be simulated in other regions, serving to sustain fertile land and
work opportunities around the world.