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Conservation of Forests Sir, Forests are of immense importance to the life and prosperity of human beings and nations. Both rural and urban population is equally dependent on the forests. Every day we come across several commodities made of precious forest treasure. The attracting furniture, household goods, building material, body of vehicles, wooden bridges etc. etc. all are made at the cost of forests. Apart from fulfilling these necessities of urbanisation, the forests add to ecological and environmental homeostasis. Fresh air and rainfall are the gifts of these forests. The list of benefits from forests never ends. But despite knowing the consequences of deforestation the cutting of trees to meet the needs of urbanisation is on and on. Experts believe that for sustaining agriculture and maintaining the quality of environment atleast one third of country's land should be covered by forests. There are contradictions regarding the actual forest cover in India. According to central forestry commission (1980) total forest cover was about 22.7 percent. Environmentalist believe it to be 17 percent. However, remote sensing survey shows it to be only 14 percent. Two forest types Tropical dry deciduous (38.7 percent) and moist deciduous (30.9 percent) constitute the bulk of our forests. The deforestation caused by increasing industrialisation and urbanisation creates a serious threat to quality of life and also the future of environment. According to an estimate the 7,000 million hectares of forest land in year 1900 decreased to 2890 hect in 1975 and by the end of this year it is estimated to be only 1905 million hectares, globally. The tropical rain forests had shown a marked decrease form 1600 million hectares to only 938 million hectares. The causative agents of deforestation are uncontrolled human and livestock population, increased requirement of timber and firewood, enhanced grazing and expansion of agricultural land. The deforestation has caused intensive soil erosion, floods, draughts, loss of wild life and has lead to deterioration of economy and quality of life. To avoid the serious repercussion the deforestation must be equalised by planting at least equal number of trees. The social forestry and programmes must strive for increasing the forest cover instead of doing it in papers only. All this need the active involvement of all the citizens and effective formulation of forest policy. "Save forests to save ourselves", should be our motive. Yours etc... |
