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4 mojatu .com News & Sports NOTTINGHAM’S 1 ST FGM ZERO TOLERANCE ANNIVERSARY Mojatu Foundation has led the celebration of the first anniversary since Nottingham City became the first City of Zero-tolerance to Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) in the UK. The event held on Tuesday 6 February at Farmeco Community Care Farm, Screveton was marked with a tree planting ceremony that brought over 40 strategic partners from as far as Wales and Scotland. The celebration also marked the International Day of Zero Tolerance for FGM, celebrated on 6th February every year. Attendees included political, community and faith leaders, charities, policy makers, funders, local authorities and other organisations tackling FGM, individuals and well-wishers. The ceremony included adoption of trees and installation of plaques, with personalised messages, as a gesture of supporting the end FGM campaign. Messages on tree plaques to support the campaign included memory of a loved one, a family, on behalf of an organisation, group, church, mosque etc. Not even the bad weather nor the muddy fields stopped the attendees from getting their hands cold and dirty in the symbolic ceremony that saw all of them put the roots of over 40 fruit trees into the earth linking social justice to the environment. Thousands of people and future generations will enjoy the fruits of their labour and their messages will remain as a legacy of their contribution to social justice and the fight for gender equality! Many of those who planted trees vowed to bring their family members, colleagues or friends to visit their tree in solidarity to the End FGM Movement thus engaging more people in the campaign. Through the Mojatu Foundation’s “End FGM in a Generation” campaign in UK and beyond, Nottingham City took a strong stance and declared Nottingham a “Zero-tolerance to FGM City,” the first city in the UK to do so. Survivors and Nottingham FGM Community Steering Group, run by Mojatu, spearheaded this declaration through working with local councillors and other partners. This remarkable achievement for