A contingent of 25 members of the Tegucigalpa Fire Department has joined the government initiative to plant 200,000 trees in the Honduran capital and three neighboring municipalities over the next six months. The project will begin with three overcrowded neighborhoods and then expand to the rest of the city, José Zelaya, head of the Firefighters Forestry Unit, told Tierramérica.

Fourteen secondary schools and four private universities are also participating in the initiative.

In the next two months, the firefighters hope to plant a total of 60,000 trees in various parts of the city and along the main avenues of Tegucigalpa.

Deforestation is the leading cause behind the declining volume of the water sources that supply Tegucigalpa, a city of just over a million people.