The
Declining Forest and Causes of Deforestation in Bangladesh
The
developing world’s share in global industrial round timber trade might be
further declining from its present 11 percent in the coming years. This view was
expressed by the International Tropical Timber Organization in 1999. On the
contrary, sustainable forestry plantations in developed countries are enjoying a
comparative production advantage. FAO in 1999, on the basis of recent studies
made forecast that production of round timber would continue to exceed
consumption throughout the world except in Asian countries. FAO reported on a
loss of 65.1 million hectares of rain forests in developing countries and an
increase of 8.8 million hectare plantation forest in developed countries between
1990-1995.
Apart
from this unfavourable economic trend environmental and social factors also call
for achieving a sustainable trend of tropical forestry in developing contraries.
From the above context there is an increased awareness of the need to conserve
both wood, non-wood and wildlife resources in the declining tropical forests and
to ensure that local people have equitable access to the forest resources. In
addition, international concern that exists regarding the status and output of
freshwater resource to which forest contributes positively also provides this
issue more prominence. The role of forest in climate change was discussed in the
Kyoto protocol very elaborately: the industrialized countries and the wealthy
entrepreneurs would be tempted to invest in sustainable forestry practice and
management in the light of the incentives that have come out through
ratification of the Kyoto protocol.
With
an objective to promote private investment in sustainable forest management (SFM)
developing countries should aim at (i) provision of basic information on
forestry sector, (ii) making of an inventory of obstacles to private investment
in SFM, (iii) exploration on private investment opportunities in SFM and (iv)
setting out of the recommendations for future actions.
With
the above objectives in mind the international Panel for Forest in 1997 called
for generation of additional private financial resources to contribute to SFM in
poorer countries of the tropics. But the respond to the call failed to increase
overall investment in the forestry sector of the developing countries.
Subsequently, to arouse private sectors interest in sustainable forestry in
developing countries the DG for International Cooperation of the Ministry of
Foreign Affairs commissioned FORM Ecology Consultants and the Netherlands
Committee for IUCN to investigate the issue.
Bangladesh
has a total forest land area of 2.5 million hectares out of that the Sundarbans
and coastal forest occupy near 0.8 million hectares and the CHT has nearly 0.9
hectare. Though a large area within the Sundarbans has already become
non-productive, bushy forest or vacant land, the overall situation there still
is not that frustrating like forests lands of the plain land districts e.g.
Bhawal-Madhupur and Barind tracts and the hill forests of Chittagong, Sylhet and
CHT.
As
per the landsat data CHT has 7,00,000 hectares of completely deforested USF and
355,000 hectares of partly deforested RF lands. The timber productivity
potential of CHT lands can be
assumed to be nearly 4.0 million m3 annually. At the present price in primary
makers potential annual output from CHT alone might reach Tk. 28.0 billion
within a period of 40 years. But unfortunately the present output from CHT
forest do not exceed more than Tk. 2.0 billion by any means. This potential loss
of revenue from forestry in CHT alone is too big for a poor country like
Bangladesh.
With
a view to converting the denuded and degraded hill forest lands of CHT into
productive and biologically exuberant tropical rain forest and investment of Tk.
6000 billion would be necessary. This amount of investment might be quite large
for GoB from the public sector alone. Hence, opportunities for investment in the
forestry sector can be created with the provision of attractive incentive to
that the national and international entrepreneurs might be feel encouraged to
invest in this gainful sector in CHT and elsewhere in Bangladesh.
An
investment promotion project has been initiated by GoB specify the interests and
wishes of the stakeholder groups. This group will remain responsible for final
definition of the goals, activities and setups of the entrepreneurs interested
to invest in Bangladesh in SFM programme. The proposed stakeholders group shall
include experts from finance, forestry, environment, social science, etc. These
experts shall develop mechanism for providing appropriate information based on
which sound decisions could be taken by the prospective entrepreneurs to invest
in SFM in Bangladesh.
Causes
of Deforestation in Bangladesh
The
Bangladesh forest with its exuberant majesty and biodiversity depleted and
shrank to 6 percent from 20 percent of land area within a time span of 50 years
after 1947. This happened due to policy weakness, over exploitation and law and
order failures. True, there is lack of legislation to provide protection to the
national forest but poor implementation mechanism of the existing rules perhaps
cause as greater damage in this regard.
Since
the beginning of the British Rule, the Indian subcontinent including Bangladesh
appeared to hold inexhaustible forest resources base. Rennel’s map (1866)
indicated that the Sundarban, sal forest of the Bhawal-Madhupur tracts covered
an area several times larger than it is at present. The hill forest of
Chittagong CHT, Sylhet, Mymensingh and Comilla were also densely populated by
more than 2000 flowering plant species including 300 tree species. Nearly 30
tree species in hill forest 20 species in plain land forest and 30 species in
the littoral forests used to be commercially exploited. In addition the
homesteads were covered with valuable fruit, fodder, timber, fuel wood, bamboo
and many multipurpose tree species. The demand for forest products was low and
population size was three times smaller. Hence, the government and the people of
that time could collect produces from forests freely as per need. This
demand-supply situation is now a matter of the past. For over the centuries the
policy pursued only administrators was to expand the agricultural land area by
clearing of forest by ignoring or under estimating the tangible and intangible
contributions of forest. The destructive policy, rapid change of society from
rural urban and growth of population put extra stress on forests that
consequently depleted Bangladesh forest to the present level. Enactment of
appropriate policy and legislation and their proper implementation could
probably help to save the country from present precarious situation in respect
of forest resources. In that perspective the existing forest policies and
legislation are reviewed here.
Forest
Policies
The
first outline of the policy for forest conservancy was laid down in 1858 as
Charter of Indian Forests during the reign of Lord Dalhousie. Subsequently, the
Forest Policy, 1894 indicated regarding the role of forest in the conservation
of soil, climate, watershed and prevention of erosion, siltation, flood,
cyclone, torrent, etc. However, preference on agricultural use of land over
forestry practice remained unchanged. Hence,
clearing of forest for agricultural use of land continued unabated and unchanged
even after enactment of the policy. The Forest Policy 1955 dealt with primarily
the issues related to West Pakistan forest and thus it grossly neglected the
issues that relate to Bangladesh forest. On the contrary, it was assumed under
it’s provision that Bangladesh has vast forest coverage hence emphasis in
framing the policy was put on increased exploitation of natural forest and the
need for conservation, development and management were undermined and ignored.
Consequently, a Forest Product Laboratory was set in Chittagong and Paper Mill
at Chandroghona during the mid-fifties for increased extraction and utilization
of forest products at commercial scales.
The
Forest Policy, 1955 was revised in 1962, but the policy discrimination regarding
Bangladesh forest continued even after adoption of this policy. However the need
for strengthening of Forest Department and initiation of research on Forest
Management Research in Bangladesh were felt necessary under the revised Forest
Policy, 1962. This policy also failed to support all round growth perspectives
of forest and failed to recognize the need oriented forestry research,
development and utilization. Hence, degradation of forest in Bangladesh
continued.
The
Forest Policy for the independent Bangladesh framed in 1979 remained dormant for
a long time as an office document without any effective implementation effort
due to lack of sincere intention of GoB and capability of Forest Department.
Under the changed socio-economic condition and falling law and order situation
that followed after 1972, caused rapid exhaustion of the forest resources in
Bangladesh. In addition price hike of the fossil fuel in the international
market, closure of the Suez Canal and economic isolation of Bangladesh from the
world community accelerated rapid exhaustion resources in Bangladesh including
the forest resources. The Forest Policy, 1962 was found inadequate in view of
UNCED (Rio Conference 1992) that viewed forest as multi functional, multi
dimensional and renewable biological resource production unit with multiple use
potentials. The policy makers being inspired by the Rio Conference did
ultimately realize the need for a sectoral study for framing a 20-year Forestry
Master Plan to combat the environment and ecological degradation situation in
Bangladesh. The Forestry Master Plan was published accordingly in 1993. The
National Forest Policy, 1994 subsequently enacted by MoEF in light of the
recommendations of Forestry Master Plan. The salient features of the National
Forest Policy, 1994 are (i) raising of forest covered are to 20 percent by 2015,
(ii) ensuring of coordinated participation of FD, NGOs and private individuals
in forestry related activities, (iii) Strengthening capability of FD, Bangladesh
Forest Research Institute (BFRI), (iv) Forestry Training Academy University, (v)
entrepreneurship development to deal with research development and utilization
of forest resources, (vi) reorganization of FD, BFRI, BFIDC and other forestry
sector organizations.
The
estimated resources requirement for the proposed activities was Tk. 8,000
million. ADB came forward to organize collection of fund from various donor
agencies. The Forestry Sector Project (FSP) was launched in 1997 with ADB
support of Tk. 4,000 million as the first project for implementing the FMP
recommendations. As per ADB evaluation FSP though launched since mid 1997 is a
sick project and failed to reach the physical and financial targets.
Forest
Legislation
The
forest offences in British-India were dealt under the Indian Penal Codes until
the forest in several states was declared as State Forest for management,
exploration and conservation purpose. The customary rights of people as well as
the public interest in forestry sector recognized by the government are
conflicting to conservation and management of state forests. Hence, it was soon
realized that to deal with the vivid nature of forest offences that take place
within the state forests special laws required to be enacted. The Forest Act
1865 was therefore enacted in India to prevent crimes, protecting resources
e.g., trees, wildlife, ecology, watershed, landscape, etc., and to expand and
manage the state forests. Hence, the Act was subsequently revised in 1878.
Finally, the Forest Act, 1927 was enacted to provide full-scale legal coverage
for protection and development of Reserve Forest and other types of state
managed forests. This Act was valid in Bangladesh to deal with Forest offences
until enactment of the Forest Act, 1994 with the subsequent Amendment in 2000.
Seventeen sections of Article xvi of the Forest Act, 1927 were amended and the
linguistic errors were corrected by the enactment of Forest (Amendment) Act,
2000.
Other
laws, ordinances and rules of general nature that have a strong bearing in
relation to forest administration, management and conservation include (i)
Bangladesh Wildlife (Preservation) Act 1973, (Amendment) 1974 and 1998 (ii)
Bangladesh Environment Conservation Act 1995, (iii) Environmental Conservation
Rule, 1997, (iv) Hill Cutting Ordinance 1986, (v) Brick Burning Act 1989, (vi)
Cattle Trespass Act, 1871, etc.
From
the above discussion it becomes apparent that there had been defined policies
for forestry practice in Bangladesh since 1865. But only few of these are
satisfactory to the needs of time and the legislation enacted for pursuing the
policies are rather punitive in nature than encouraging to private sector
involvement in forestry activities. Moreover, the prevailing law and order in
Bangladesh makes FD unable to implement the existing legislation and in
providing protection the national forests. For example, as per several of FD
field staff and timber merchants of Cox’s Bazar, Rangamati and Khagrachari who
preferred to remain anonymous reported that it costs nearly Tk. 70,000 in the
form of extortion for moving a seven tonne truck from these stations to Dhaka.
The parties involved in extorting the money are 27 where FD’s share is less
than 20 percent. It, therefore, becomes clear that none of the single agencies
including FD can totally stop pilferage of forest resources in Bangladesh.
The
FD officials at all levels are in favour of enactment of more harsh forest rules
with provisions of severe punitive measures and non-bailable confinement. But
promulgation or enactment of Acts along may not be of much help under the
existing morally and socio-economically degraded condition of Bangladesh.
Source:
The Bangladesh Observer, May
6, 2001