A forest fire, probably from neighboring garbage and weed burning, burned down a section of the IITA Forest Reserve in February 2021. Though the IITA Security Unit and the forest night rangers curtailed the fire, many trees suffered severe damage. The IITA Forest Center, therefore, called on the Nigerian Conservation Foundation (NCF) to donate seedlings to replant the burnt area—a request they readily obliged.
On 27 May, members of the Nigerian Conservation Foundation (NCF)—Dr Joseph Onoja, Wenceslas Gatarabirwa, Ian Barber, and Paul Insua-Cao—and student-members of IITA Forest Center’s Schools Conservation Club (SCC) converged at the IITA Forest Reserve to replant trees in the burnt area. The SCC members were students from two secondary schools in Ibadan, Nigeria.