Santo Domingo.- Dominican Republic’s forests cover morethan 39% of the country’s territory, which puts it within the MillenniumDevelopment Goals’ target of 34%, said Environment minister Bautista Rojas on Sunday.
"We also surpassed the government’s target of plantingover 50 million trees, while many ecosystems recover and have a higher percentageof our territory to 25% under the protection regime," the official said tomark World Environment Day.
In a ceremony held at Santo Domingo Este’s main park,headed by president Danilo Medina, Rojas warned of the environment crimes’ impacton the ecosystems and urged the people to be more aware.
"In almost every country in the world wildlife isthreatened by illegal trafficking of species, destruction of natural ecosystemsand mountains, increasing the agricultural frontier, ranching, indiscriminatelogging, open pit mining and uncontrolled urbanization, and the Dominican Republicisn’t exempt from that," Rojas said.
Under the slogan "Go wild for life, the future ofwildlife is in our hands," the event attracted hundreds of people who tookpart in the organized activities.