The Ogun State Commissioner for Forestry, Taiwo Oludotun, has disclosed that the present administration has successfully revamped all nine forest reserves in the state and planted over five million trees covering about 500 hectares within the last six years.
Oludotun stated this while defending the Ministry of Forestry’s budget at the Treasury Board Meeting on the 2026–2028 Medium Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) and the 2026 budget, held at the Obas Complex, Oke-Mosan, Abeokuta, on Thursday.
He noted that the forest reserves had become moribund before his appointment as Commissioner, adding that the Ministry adopted strategic partnerships with international companies by leasing portions of forest land to plant trees, which later served as raw materials for their production processes.
According to him, the Ministry also cultivated over three million trees independently to ensure sustainability, emphasizing that tree planting is a long-term investment, which explained why the Ministry was often undervalued in terms of performance assessment.
The Commissioner lamented that some cocoa farmers had intentionally destroyed tree plantations in a bid to expand their cultivation areas, stressing that it is collaborating with the Ministry of Agriculture to curb such activities.
Oludotun further stated that the Ministry requires the proposed budget to procure additional machinery to strengthen its task force operations and curb illegal activities within the forest reserves.
In his response, the Chief Economic Adviser to the Governor and Commissioner for Finance, Dapo Okubadejo, described the forestry sector as one of the state’s major natural endowments, offering a significant competitive advantage.
He advised that the sector should not be viewed merely as a source of raw materials for the furniture industry but should also explore other opportunities such as sustainable cultivation and wildlife conservation, which are areas that could attract foreign donors and investors.
Okubadejo urged the Ministry to block revenue leakages and adopt cashless policies to boost the state’s internally generated revenue.
