A recent article published in the Science Advances journal has raised the spectacle of apocalypse with the undeniable findings of the researchers and scientists that the earth has entered sixth mass extinction phase. What with vertebrae vanishing at 114 times faster than normal, humans could be among the first victims, according to it.
If this report does not stir us, nothing ever will till it might be just too late. The study, which its authors described as “conservative“, is based on documented extinctions of vertebrates, or animals with internal skeletons such as frogs, reptiles and tigers, from fossil records and other historical data.
The research, however, found that since 1900, more than 400 vertebrates have disappeared, an extinction rate 100 times higher than in other non-extinction periods. According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature, about 41 per cent of all amphibian species and 26 per cent of all mammals are threatened with extinction.
The causes of species’ loss ranges from climate change to pollution to deforestation and more. Role of forests in checking climate change, pollution and species loss cannot thus be over emphasised.
The dependency of people worldwide on forests particularly for their food security was clearly brought about in a recent report of Food and Agriculture Organisation last year which found that in rural areas in less developed nations, wood energy is the only source and one third people in developing and under developed nations use wood for energy needs and some 840 million or 12 per cent people collect it for their own purpose.
Some 40 per cent or around 2.4 billion people in less developed countries use wood for cooking purpose and in addition some 740 million may use it for boiling water. Also, collection of non-timber forest produce adds to food security and in meeting essential nutritional needs.
Forests also play a very signi-ficant role in providing employment. According to the report, formal forest sector employs some 13.2 million people and informal sector some 41 million people across the world. At least 18 per cent or 1.2 billion people use forest products in shelter and construction of their homes.
People are as important as trees and all benefit from forests to locals must be assessed, surveyed and documented after collection of relevant data with the help of organisations that do the job. Forest Policy must focus explicitly on forests’ role in providing food, energy and shelter. Re-cognition of the value of the forest service such as erosion protection and pollination is essential to sound decision making.
Besides this, sustainable forest management must include more efficient production to meet rising and changing dema-nds including the informal sector. Providing people with access to forest resources and markets particularly at local levels is a powerful way to enhance socio-economic benefits. Capacity bui-lding should be the focus area to make real progress in socio-economic benefits from Forests.
Environmental resources
Earlier Forests were considered indicator for only Goal-7 of Millennium Development Goal (adopted in 2000 to reduce extreme poverty with series of time bound targets by 2015) which pertained to loss of environmental resources and even these have not been achieved. Even though global rate of deforestation has been reduced but still it is alarmingly high in many parts of the world which loses forests of the size of England every year.
The challenge is to have convincing evidences about the role of forests in the sustainable development without which the policy makers are not likely to discontinue land use policies that favour the conversion of forests to agriculture and other land uses. Realising the critical role of forests in sustainable development, the UN Conference on Sustainable Development’s (Rio +20) Sustainable Development Goal was launched in 2012. It has given good opportunity to properly recognise role of forests in achieving above goals especially their socio economic contribution.
Accordingly, four Global Objectives on Forests that have been identified include reversing loss of forest cover through sustainable forest management, enhancing forest based social, economic and environmental benefit, increasing significantly the area of sustainably managed forests and reversing the official development assistance for sustainable forest management.
India too should join the new forest conservation initiatives and not lag behind in these objectives. The writing on the wall is clear. Our future depends on the initiatives and actions taken by the present policy makers and leaders.
(The writer is former principal chief conservator of forests, Karnataka)