Approximately 353 million trees were planted in Ethiopia in a single day as part of a , according to a government minister.

Staff from the United Nations, the African Union and foreign embassies took part in the effort, with BBC News reporting some Ethiopian government offices have been shut down to let civil servants take part.

Throughout Monday, Ethiopia鈥檚 minister of innovation and technology Dr. Getahun Mekuria was updating his followers on the country鈥檚 progress.

By early evening, he that the country had planted 353,633,660 tree seedlings in 12 hours.

The mass tree-planting effort was part of the country鈥檚 鈥�, which intends to grow four billion trees in Ethiopia this summer -- with the intended goal to tackle the effects of deforestation and climate change.

Forest coverage in Ethiopia has declined from 35 per cent in the early 1900s to little more than four per cent in the 2000s, according to UN statistics.

The 鈥淕reen Legacy鈥� initiative is running in a thousand sites across the country and encourages every citizen to plant at least 40 seedlings.