Pingtan leaders, Gong Qinggai and You Menglong, plant trees. [Photo provided to China Daily]

About 200 Pingtan officials and gardeners planted trees along Tanxi Road in Pingtan Island, Fujian province, on March 11. The activity was held to celebrate China's 34th Tree-Planting Day, which falls on March 12 every year, Pingtan Times reported.

Gong Qinggai, director of the zone's administrative committee, and You Mengjun, the committee's vice-director, participated in the event. Over 7,000 seedlings of various species – including Ficus, Araucaria and Urophylla trees – were planted.

Zone officials also discussed scientific planting issues and follow-up care with landscaping technicians.

"The afforestation along Tanxi Road is a program that requires planting techniques to improve the tree survival rate," said Gong.

Pingtan plans to plant 10 million trees annually in the following five years since 2010. It has planted 37 million trees to date. The forest coverage rate in the zone rose to 35.1 percent from 29 percent after three years of effort. The island county aims to built itself into a "forest garden island".

Edited by Chen Zhilin and Michael Thai