KABUL (Pajhwok): Deforestation in eastern Kunar province has been curbed following the revival of the Community Charter and creation of new check-posts, officials said on Tuesday.
Acting Governor Maulvi Najeebullah Hanif told Pajhwok Afghan News that a strict ban had been imposed on timber cutting and transportation of firewood from the province.
He said some individual might have covertly transported timber and firewood out of the province in initial days of the Taliban government.
However, the acting governor explained, strict measures were currently in place and nobody could smuggle wood from Kunar forests.
Hanif added the provincial government had set up new checkpoints on the Kunar-Nangarhar road to ensure an end to the scourge of timber smuggling.
“Forests are national assets and the Taliban’s position on protecting them is crystal clear. Individuals who illegally cut forests or smuggle timber will be dealt with according to the law,” he vowed.
“Besides the use of force, we have revived the Community Charter in far-flung areas and villages, with thick forests. Under the Community Charter, individual involved in deforestation would be punished or fined,” the governor warned.
At the same time, some residents complained that deforestation was still ongoing in certain mountainous areas of the province.
They termed efforts taken by the previous government to protect forests as insufficient. Despite the spending of millions of afghanis, they grumbled, deforestation continued unabated.
Resident Mohammad Shoaib Gharwal said not only local powerful individuals, timber mafia and armed groups were involved in deforestation but some members of the previous government also had hand in this illicit practice.
“In previous years, Kunar timber was smuggled to large cities of the country, as well as neighbouring Pakistan,” he alleged.
Another inhabitant, Hashmat Zhman, believed the government should prevent deforestation and evolve a mechanism to dispose of the timber already chopped. The mechanism should benefit the government and the people.
Forty percent of Kunar forests that account for 16 percent of the country’s forests have been damaged over the past several years.
nh/mud
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