COIMBATORE: An ‘oxygen park’ with ‘Beema Bamboo’ saplings is set up at the Department of Agronomy, Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, here. By planting the first Beema Bamboo sapling, Dr. S. Balaji, former principal chief conservator of forest, Government of Tamil Nadu, inaugurated the oxygen space on Saturday in the presence of Dr. N. Kumar, vice-chancellor, TNAU, Coimbatore. The green space at the university campus will be home to 590 non-flowering ‘Beema Bamboo’ species.
"The park is the first-of-its-kind in the textile city spreads across an area of 1.45-acres. Proper silviculture procedures such as addition of plant growth promoting bacteria, vermin compost, farm yard manure (FYM) and bio-control agents were followed while preparing the pits for planting," a source from the university said.
Every fully grown bamboo tree generates over 300 kilograms of oxygen every year, and it is just sufficient for one person for a whole year. Further, it has the capacity to absorb 80 tonnes of carbon dioxide per acre every year.
One matured Beema Bamboo after four years absorbs more than 400 kilograms of carbon dioxide annually from the surrounding areas. The special bamboo clone is developed by conventional breeding method that does not involve genetically modified organism (GMO).
