Abu Dhabi: Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince and Deputy Prime Minister, Mohamed Bin Salman, said Saturday the “Saudi Arabia Green Initiative” and the “Green Middle East Initiative”, which will be launched soon, will chart the country’s and the region’s roadmap for protecting the land and nature with clear and ambitious milestones, which will make a strong contribution to achieving global targets.
The Crown Prince said, “As a leading global producer of oil, we are fully aware of our share of the responsibility in advancing the fight against the climate crisis, and as our pioneering role in stabilising energy markets during the oil and gas era, we will act to lead the next green era.”
He added, “The Kingdom and the region are facing many environmental challenges, such as desertification, which poses an economic threat to the region, as it is estimated that 13 billion dollars are drained by sandstorms in the region every year and air pollution from greenhouse gases is estimated to have reduced the average age of citizens by one and a half years.”
He continued, “We will act through the Saudi Green Initiative to raise vegetation cover, reduce carbon emissions, combat pollution and land degradation, and preserve marine life.”
Global target
The Saudi green initiatives, he said, will include planting 10 billion trees, equivalent to rehabilitating about 40 million hectares of degraded land, 12 times increase in the area covered by trees, which make the Kingdom’s contribution of more than 4 per cent to achieving the goals of the global initiative to reduce land degradation and wildlife habitats, and 1 per cent of the global target for planting a trillion trees.
The initiatives also envisage to raise protected areas to more than 30 percent of its land area, estimated at 600,000 square kilometers, to exceed the current global target of protecting 17 per cent of each country’s land, in addition to a number of initiatives to protect the marine and coastal environment.
The Saudi Crown Prince added, “The Saudi Green Initiative will also reduce carbon emissions by more than 4 per cent of global contributions, through renewable energy projects that will provide 50 per cent of electricity production in the Kingdom by 2030, and clean hydrocarbon technologies that will eliminate more than 130 million tons of carbon emissions, in addition to raising the proportion of waste diversion from landfills to 94 per cent.
The Crown Prince stated that “while there is still much to be done, the Kingdom is determined to make a lasting global impact and based on its pioneering role, it will start work on the Green Middle East Initiative with the sister countries in the Gulf Cooperation Council and the Middle East.”
“In partnership with its brothers in the countries of the Middle East, Saudi Arabia seeks to plant an additional 40 billion trees in the Middle East,” the Crown Prince said. He added the initiative aims to plant 50 billion trees, the largest reforestation plan in the world and twice the size of the Great Green Wall in the Sahel region, the second largest regional initiative,” he said.
Carbon levels
This project, the Saudi Crown Prince added, will work to restore an area equivalent to 200 million hectares of degraded land, which represents 5 percent of the global goal of planting one trillion trees and achieves a reduction of 2.5 per cent of global carbon levels.
He noted, “The share of energy production nowadays is not more than 7 per cent in the Middle East, and that the technologies used in oil production in the region are not efficient.”
He pointed out, “Saudi Arabia will work with these countries to transfer knowledge and share expertise, which will contribute to reducing carbon emissions from oil production in the region by more than 60 per cent, and these joint efforts will achieve a reduction in carbon emissions of more than 10 per cent of global contributions.
