'Let's preserve trees, before the last tree vanishes'

God has cared for these trees, saved them from drought, disease, avalanches, and a thousand tempests and floods. But he cannot save them from fools. - John Muir (Scottish-born American naturalist, author, and early advocate of preservation of wilderness in the United States)

By Dhaneshi YATAWARA

Trees play' a big role in preserving the environment and making the world a better place to live. Trees need to be preserved if the environment is to be protected. There will be no environment without trees," said H.M. Hitisekara, Conservator General of Forests of Sri Lanka. Being a bio-diversity hot spot, the Forest Conservation Department has a serious role to play in protecting this green cover.

The department was started during the colonial era and forests were important for the well-being of the environment. The Forest Conservation department today has to play the role of a conservator rather than a controller. "The Forest Conservation Department is the key player in forest conservation in Sri Lanka," said Hitisekara. Protecting forest's, increasing forest cover and, forest management - are the main functions of the Forest Conservation Department and the other related functions follow at the next level. "Functions assigned to the Forest Conservation Department are related to the country's legal system," he added.

"Today our services have expanded - earlier it was to protect forest cover but today we have to shoulder other responsibilities in the development of the country too. Most of the resources are embedded in forests. Our duty today is to protect these forests while contributing to the development of the country and managing them," Hitisekara said.

Forests in Sri Lanka are managed under four categories - Strict natural reserves, Natural reserves, other forests and World Heritage sites. World heritage sites are categorised according to its significance in the eco-system since fauna and flora of forests also represents major stages of the earth's history. The world has come to an agreement today to safeguard such culturally and ecologically important places for posterity. Strict Reserves are forests that need to be protected in its existing nature. There are legal boundaries imposed to carry out work in these reserves, and no one can exceed these.

Considering the significance of forests the Government took the decision that forests should come under the Department of Forest Conservation. Thus forests that were under the management of local authorities are now under the focus on the country's development, the Forest Conservation Department has become a key decision maker. "Decisions are made to protect forests amidst a demanding background with the rapid pace of development," he added.

There is a huge need to increase forest cover. At the moment, only 27 percent of the country is covered by forests. According to the country's economic development strategy based on the 'Mahinda Chinthana' the vision for tomorrow, forest cover needs to be expanded to 36 percent.

The forest Conservation Department under the guidance of Environment Minister Anura Priyadarshana Yapa contribute in many ways to this," he said. According to him one aspect is to protect existing forest cover. This is to prevent illegal destruction of forests. The next step is community participated forest conservation which was started quite recently.

The other innovative approach is to associate forest conservation to cultivation with economic value. In Bibile and Moneragala areas, forest conservation is associated with rubber cultivation. We allocate appropriate land for cultivation which are close to forests. This gives economic benefit to the people as well. So protecting forests is not a burden to them.

Another important aspect is reforestation on mountain tops. Already we have started growing 350 ha in Nuwara Eliya, Kegalle, Kandy and Badulla. As a result of deforestation since colonial times for the plantation industry, mountain top forest cover was fading and we need to regenerate it. Environment Minister Anura Priyadarshana Yapa during the 2011 UN General Assembly pointed out to the world, the special attention Sri Lanka had given to mountain top reforestation.

Supply

Being the Forest Department we need to supply the Government's annual timber requirement. For this we have allocated specific lands where plants with timber value will be cultivated and managed to get the Government's requirement of timber for the year. For a year 891 ha will be cultivated with trees with timber value, i.e. Teak, Jak, Mahogany etc. We need to maintain cultivations too. We are engaged in growing trees with timber value with community participation. For this nearly 100 - 200 ha of land has been grown. Adequate plants are available in plant nurseries.

Hitisekara said, most important is the forest officer working at grass root level who is responsible for protecting forests as well as managing nearly 3000 officers working in the Forest Department. We are appointing officers to the North as well. We are recruiting more people to fill vacancies. Forest conservation will not be successful if the Department is going to handle it alone. So we need to create more programs to get community participation.

It is in this concept that the 'Deyata Sevana' The National Tree planting program will be important. Initiated under the guidance of Minister Anura Priyadashana Yapa following the Mahinda Chinthana the first program in 2010, was a great success. We planted 2.6 million plants during the last year though the initial target was 1.1 million. A recent audit report indicated that more than 2.1 million plants that were planted are still there.

Thus the 2011 program will be conducted on November 15 with the participation of almost all Government institutes, private companies, non governmental organisations etc. across the island.

"For this years program we have 900,000 tree saplings in our nurseries to be provided to the required institutes. Apart from this several community based associations have also taken up the responsibility to grow saplings according to the quality we have set up," he added. The Department normally produces saplings twice a year according to climatic changes, growth can vary. "There is a heavy demand for plants from the public compared to the past. Thus we are taking measures to expand our services," Hitisekara explained.

Controlling bush fires is another sensitive area which mostly happens in the drought season. Sometimes people set fire intentionally and sometimes it's accidental. "There are constant queries from the public as to why forest fires are not controlled quickly.

Sometimes these places are quite unreachable. Most of the time it is in the 'Mana' forests and the fire spreads rapidly and unpredictably. When trying to control the fire, forest officers also face grave danger. They can get surrounded by the fires which makes them unable to escape. This is a tedious job, officers have to work two to three days at a stretch," Hitisekara said. Maximum speed help is given to the Air Force, Army, the Police and the Special Task Force. Through the Disaster Management Centres assistance is provided in these kind of situations.

"As a precaution, in areas prone to fires we maintain broad roads within the forests to avoid it from spreading. This gives some sort of protection," he said. There are community-based groups to assist the Department in these issues too. There are communities who do small businesses close to these reserves and through these people the Department gain assistance, specially in emergency situations. "When there is a forest fire local people play a big role. If forests survive and trees live long the benefit is for the people," he explained.

Clearings

"Timber is good business and we understand this. There is no significant increase in timber felling, yet it is happening. There are more threats for the forest Conservation Department with the increase in demand. We continue to take legal action to control illegal timber felling," he said. "Within our scope I can assure we are doing our best. When we have to face organised groups involved in illegal timber felling, the threat is more. Today the law is stronger than a few years back. The Police and STF provide help in giving us information on such issues," he added.

The Department has to control unauthorised clearing of forests. Hitisekara said that when the law is in action people are more cautious to go beyond the legal framework.

One of the existing debates is road construction close to the Sinharaja area. "The road across the forest is based on the requirement of the people. Because of the problematic situation, Minister Anura Priyadarshana Yapa appointed a panel of experts to study the real situation and as of now, investigations are almost over. It is at the final discussion stage and based on it we will be able to take a decision".

Is this road out of the Sinharaja boundary? This is out of the Sinharaja boundary. In fact for a few months we were physically demarcating the boundary of the Sinharaja and all forest reserves of the country. The program will continue and will take considerable time as drawing the boundary line is complicated," Hitisekara added.

There are other allegations where environment activists claim that forest reserves are being cleared. "If its within our range we can take action. But in certain cases the forest lands belong to temples and devalas under the 'Devala Gam' Act.

There are clearings taking place in those lands where we are not supposed to take action. We cannot intervene anything beyond our capacity," he added.

Forest cover increase is of Economic benefit. The more forest cover there is the more environment will be purified. It would improve the quality of the environment people are living in, is an economic benefit to a country.

We are promoting tourists, local and foreign, to come and enjoy the natural beauty of the forests. We must feel the joy of being surrounded by nature. We have allocated beautiful places for the people to relax and enjoy holidays. We invite the public to visit these places often and help to spread the message of conservation across the world.

By protecting forests it is not the Forest Conservation Department that will reap the benefit but the entire country. Forests are a national asset.