Sudan: Planting trees to ease environmental impact of hosting refugees

Drive a few hours north-east of Khartoum towards Kassala, near the Sudanese border with Eritrea, and you will come across one of the UN refugee agency's most striking achievements in the region – acre after acre of trees, stretching into the distance. UNHCR has planted more than 19 million of them in a programme, launched a quarter-of-a-century ago, to green the denuded landscape of eastern Sudan. Species of acacia, neem, eucalyptus and many others, now cover almost 28,400 hectares of once barren land.