Four & Half Decades of Confusion

We have to hand it to our Parliamentarians – their eloquence is riveting! That said, I am afraid that their glibness fails to mask their apparent lack of adequate knowledge on some of the subjects they speak on.

A case in point is the ongoing discussions related to forestry - in both the Upper, as well as, in the Lower Houses of the Parliament. It is clear that some of the Honorable Members are confusing PRESERVATION for CONSERVATION. Perhaps the following will help bring some bit of clarity to the issue, so that the goat is not confused for the sheep.

Quality of our forests - valuable renewable natural resources left to turn to dust and debris!

It is my view that the intergenerational confusion began in the late 1970s when His Majesty the IVth Druk Gyalpo banned timber harvesting and nationalized illegal brown jacket cardamom plantations. In my understanding, that act has to be viewed as an act of preservation – and not be confused as an act of conservation.

In the North-Western regions of the country, powerful and influential private timber merchants, in cahoots with corrupt Forestry officials, caused indiscriminate and illegal felling of the trees. In the South-Central parts of the country, large swaths of virgin forests were being usurped and cleared of mature trees – for illegal plantation of the highly lucrative brown jacket cardamom, and for firing tens of hundreds of Battis - to dry the harvested cardamom.

The King was so infuriated by the mindless acts of destruction caused to the country’s forest stand that He ordered the seizure of the illegal cardamom plantations and banning of the harvesting of trees. It was an act designed to PRESERVE our forests from total annihilation – it was NOT an act of CONSERVATION. I know because I was one among the principal players in implementing the policy – for disposing off the residual stock of semi-processed lumber taken over from the timber merchants, and marketing of the yield of cardamom (from illegal plantations), harvesting of which was mandated to be overseen by the district administration officials. (How the policy implementation was botched up is an interesting story to be told another day)

Modern, scientific forest management practices encourage mindful human intervention – both for a robust ecosystem, as well as for biodiversity. Unfortunately, it is clear that we in Bhutan have come to believe that a densely populated forest is a sign of a successful conservation policy. That is why we unfailingly take great pride in claiming that we have forest coverage in excess of 70% of our land mass – clueless that those forests are causing more harm than good.

Please pause for a minute and think:

Why do lionesses deliberately abandon some of their cubs?
Why do some birds push some of their chicks off the nests?
Why do farmers prune their fruit trees and weed their kitchen gardens?
Why does silviculture promote thinning of the forest stand?
Why do human couples practice birth control?