FOREST SHOULD BE PROTECTED FROM DEFORESTATION
1. INTRIDUCTION
Deforestation is the clearance of forests by logging and burning. Deforestation occurs for many reasons: trees or derived charcoal are used as, or sold, for fuel or as lumber, while cleared land is used as pasture for livestock, plantations of commodities, and settlements. The removal of trees without sufficient reforestation has resulted in damage to habitat, biodiversity loss and aridity. It has adverse impacts on bio sequestration of atmospheric carbon dioxide. Deforested regions typically incur significant adverse soil erosion and frequently degrade into wasteland. Disregard or ignorance of intrinsic value, lack of ascribed value, lax forest management and deficient environmental laws are some of the factors that allow deforestation to occur on a large scale. In many countries, deforestation is an ongoing issue that is causing extinction, changes to climatic conditions, desertification, and displacement of indigenous people.
2. PART A: Deforestation affects on Environment:
Small scale deforestation was practiced by some societies for tens of thousands of years before the beginnings of civilization.[1]In Europe there is little solid evidence before 7000 BC. Mesolithic foragers used fire to create openings for red deer and wild boar. In Great Britain, shade-tolerant species such as oak and ash are replaced in the record by hazels, brambles, grasses and nettles.[2] Removal of the forests led to decreased transpiration, resulting in the formation of upland peat. Widespread decrease in elm pollen across Europe between 8400-8300 BC and 7200-7000 BC, starting in southern Europe and gradually moving north to Great Britain, may represent land clearing by fire at the onset of Neolithic agriculture.
a) Temperature limits
Trees provide shade and the shaded area has a moderated temperature. With shade, the temperature may be 98 degrees Fahrenheit during the day and 60 degrees at night. Without the shade, temperatures would be much colder during the night and around 130 degrees during the day. [3]Moisture from the oceans fall as rain on adjacent coastal regions. The moisture is soon sent up to the atmosphere through the transpiration of foliage to fall again on inland forest areas. This cycle repeats several times to rain on all forest regions.[4]
b) Area Changes to wasteland
This is related to the desicaiton of previously moist forest soil. Primarily because of the lack of moisture and the inability to keep moisture, soil that is exposed to the sun will dry and turn into desert sand.[5] Even before that happens, when the soil becomes dry, dust storms become more frequent. [6]At that point, the soil becomes usesless. Recently, groups challenged those conclusions. Some scientists claim that the conclusion were based on insufficient data. Nevertheless, desertification still threatens more and more drylands.[7]
c) Carbon Dioxide and Nitrogen Exchange
The rainforests are important in the carbon dioxide exchange process. They are second only to oceans as the most important “sink” for atmospheric carbon dioxide. The most recent survey on deforestaiton and greenhouse gas emisions reports that deforestation may account for as much as 10% of current greenhouse gas emmisions.[8] Greenhouse gases are gases in the atmosphere that literally trap heat. There is a theory that as more greenhouse gasses are released into the atmosphere, more heat gets trapped. Thus, there is a global warming trend in which the average temperature becomes progressivily higher. The relationship between deforestation and soil ersion.[9]
2. PART B: Industrial era and Deforestation
In the 19th century, introduction of steamboats in the United States was the cause of deforestation of banks of major rivers, such as the Mississippi River, with increased and more severe flooding one of the environmental results.[10] The steamboat crews cut wood every day from the riverbanks to fuel the steam engines. Between St. Louis and the confluence with the Ohio River to the south, the Mississippi became more wide and shallow, and changed its channel laterally. Attempts to improve navigation by the use of snag pullers often resulted in crews’ clearing large trees 100 to 200 feet (61 m) back from the banks. Several French colonial towns of the Illinois Country, such as Kaskaskia, Cahokia and St. Philippe, Illinois were flooded and abandoned in the late 19th century, with a loss to the cultural record of their archeology.[75]
The wholescale clearance of woodland to create agricultural land can be seen in many parts of the world, such as the Central forest-grasslands transition and other areas of the Great Plains of the United States.[11] Specific parallels are seen in the 20th-century deforestation occurring in many developing nations.
a) Contraction of industries:
It is only with the new Constitution of 1988 that the federal government “obligates” states and counties to carry out environmental impact assessment as a tool of environmental monitoring. However, fertilizer companies have fought efforts made by the legislatures of the southernmost states of Brazil to control the use of fertilizers in their respective regions as “unconstitutional.” Few states have implemented specific enough environmental policies to be workable. Because the bulk of the state and municipal taxes are not collected and used locally, but go to the federal coffers first, and then a small proportion is returned to state and local government, little incentive has been put into effective tax policies that benefit the local environment.
Under Article 26 of the 1988[12] Constitution, destruction of the forests became a crime under the penal code.This new constitutional provision has been rarely enforced and is based upon similar codes in France where it has been applied more successfully. Other general norms have been passed that provide protection to the fauna, the soil, the air, the water, the fisheries, and natural resources. The states have their own constitutions, derived from the federal one, which have attempted to elaborate on their obligations towards environmental protection. While well meaning, only one of the states made any effort to specify how they would create a fund to pay for the cost of protecting their environment.[13] Without such practical steps, and given the precarious nature of most states’ budgets, it is unlikely that enforcement by state or municipal authorities will occur. Other important obstacles to the protection of the environment in Brazil derive from archaic notions of the rights of owners of private property. Intervention of public authorities in what goes on inside a legally titled property is opposed by the elites who control very large properties, and by others who aspire to someday have them. Even though the Constitution links the right to private property to its “social function,” this linkage has remained vague in legal terms and unapplied to destruction of vast areas within the private domain of individuals or corporations.
b) The subject of Industrial law:
One of the most complex wrinkles in the landscape of international environmental protection is the one presented by the concern with national control felt by a number of countries.[14] Every country is particularly sensitive to this issue. To understand this hypersensitivity it is necessary to recall how Countries expanded from its Northeastern hump, given to Portugal in 1493 through the Treaty of Tordesillas.[15] As can be expected, one of the most persistent themes in these gathering has been to blame the developed countries for their exploitation of Forest resources, while preaching of the value of conservation to the Amazonian countries. [16]This is important because multinationals appear to behave in contradiction to the actions of the states wherein they have their corporate headquarters.[17] In recent gatherings of representatives of the various bar associations from Latin America, a common theme was to introduce environmental law into the curriculum of the law schools, and the formulation of laws which have real penalties in a court of law for environmental transgressions.[18]
c) The Environment and General Industries
One of the notable changes in international attitudes towards environment is clear, from the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro. In that document, the rights of indigenous people to their lands was conceded and connected to their stewardship of nature. The United Nations General Assembly declared 1993 the International Year of the World’s Indigenous People.[19] The process of deforestation had numerous social effects for the population of the world. The indigenous people that lived in the rainforest were the hardest hit, so naturally when examining the social effects of deforestation, much of the analysis will focus on the indigenous population. It is equally important to note that besides the indigenous population, there were also reverie agriculturalists and backwoods agriculturalists, hunters, and extractivists that lived in the rainforests. The information presented here comes from case study reports in the regions of Rondonia and Para.[20]
.The third group were the hunters, backwoods agriculturalists, and extractivists. Extractivists collected rubber, nuts and other forest product to sell.[21]All three groups and in particular the indigenous pollution suffered greatly from the process of deforestation. Case studies documented in detail how outside people invaded the indigenous population reserves and how various devices deprived the indigenous people of their traditional lands and forest. [22]Consequently, the indigenous population suffered greatly from mercury poisoning because fish was the primary source of protein for them. Cattle ranchers, loggers and land speculators also invaded the indigenous lands. Many forests, especially those near navigable steams were cleared.[23]
CONCLUTION:
To meet the world’s demand for wood, it has been suggested by forestry writers Bodkins and Sedro that high-yielding forest plantations are suitable. It has been calculated that plantations yielding 10 cubic meters per hectare annually could supply all the timber required for international trade on 5% of the world’s existing forestland. By contrast, natural forests produce about 1-2 cubic meters per hectare; therefore, 5 to 10 times more forestland would be required to meet demand. Forester Chad Oliver has suggested a forest mosaic with high-yield forest lands interspersed with conservation land. Reforestation through tree planting could take advantage of changing precipitation patterns due to climate change. This would be done by studying where precipitation is projected to increase and setting up reforestation projects in these locations. Areas such as Niger, Sierra Leone and Liberia are especially important candidates because they also suffer from an expanding desert (the Sahara) and decreasing biodiversity (while being important biodiversity hotspots).
REFARENCE:
1. Kauppi, P. E.; Ausubel, J. H.; Fang, J.; Mather, A. S.; Sedjo, R. A.; Waggoner, P. E. (2006). “Returning forests analyzed with the forest identity”. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 103 (46): 17574.doi:10.1073/pnas.0608343103. PMID 17101996.
2. “Use Energy, Get Rich and Save the Planet”, The New York Times, April 20, 2009
3. Burgonio, T.J. (January 3, 2008). “Corruption blamed for deforestation”. Philippine Daily Inquirer.
4. “WRM Bulletin Number 74”. World Rainforest Movement. September 2003.
5. “Global Deforestation”. Global Change Curriculum. University of Michigan Global Change Program. January 4, 2006.
6. Alain Marcoux (August 2000). “Population and deforestation”. SD Dimensions. Sustainable Development Department, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO).
7. Butler, Rhett A. “Impact of Population and Poverty on Rainforests”. Mongabay.com / A Place Out of Time: Tropical Rainforests and the Perils They Face. Retrieved May 13, 2009.
8. Jocelyn Stock, Andy Rochen. “The Choice: Doomsday or Arbor Day”. Retrieved May 13, 2009.
9. Karen. “Demographics, Democracy, Development, Disparity and Deforestation: A Crossnational Assessment of the Social Causes of Deforestation”. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Sociological Association, Atlanta Hilton Hotel, Atlanta, GA, Aug 16, 2003. Retrieved May 13, 2009.
10. “The Double Edge of Globalization”. YaleGlobal Online. Yale University Press. June 2007.
11. Butler, Rhett A. “Human Threats to Rainforests—Economic Restructuring”. Mongabay.com / A Place Out of Time: Tropical Rainforests and the Perils They Face. Retrieved May 13, 2009.
12. Susanna B. Hecht, Susan Kandel, Ileana Gomes, Nelson Cuellar and Herman Rosa (2006). “Globalization, Forest Resurgence, and Environmental Politics in El Salvador”.World Development Vol. 34, No. 2. pp. 308–323.
13. UNFCCC (2007). “Investment and financial flows to address climate change”. unfccc.int. UNFCCC. p. 81.
14. Pearce, David W (December 2001). “The Economic Value of Forest Ecosystems”. Ecosystem Health, Vol. 7, no. 4. pp. 284–296.
15. Erwin H Bulte; Mark Joenje; Hans G P Jansen (2000). “Is there too much or too little natural forest in the Atlantic Zone of Costa Rica?”. Canadian Journal of Forest Research; 30:3. pp. 495–506.
21. “NASA – Top Story – NASA DATA SHOWS DEFORESTATION AFFECTS CLIMATE”.
22. “Massive deforestation threatens food security”.
23. Deforestation, ScienceDaily
24. Confirmed: Deforestation Plays Critical Climate Change Role, ScienceDaily, May 11, 2007
25. Deforestation causes global warming, FAO
27. “Fondation Chirac » Deforestation and desertification”.
33. Broeker, Wallace S. (2006). “Breathing easy: Et tu, O2.” Columbia University
35. “Underlying Causes of Deforestation: UN Report”.
36. “Deforestation and Landslides in Southwestern Washington
style=”text-align: justify;” size=”1″ />
[1] See, Brown, Tony (1997). “Clearances and Clearings: Deforestation in Mesolithic/Neolithic Britain”. Oxford Journal of Archaeology 16: 133.
[2] See, Flannery, T (1994). The future eaters. Melbourne
[3] See, The Future of Amazonia: Destruction or Sustainable Development 1-18 (David Goodman & Anthony Hall eds., 1990); Susanna Hecht, Cattle Raising in the Eastern
[4] According to the United Nations Environmental Programmed (UNEP) in 1977, deforestation is an important factor contributing to desertification. What is unclear is how fast deserts are expanding is controversial. According to UNEP, between 1958 and 1975, the Saharan
[5] See, Kauppi, P. E.; Ausubel, J. H.; Fang, J.; Mather, A. S.; Sedjo, R. A.; Waggoner, P. E. (2006)
[6] See, Hans P. Binswanger, Brazilian Policies that Encourage Deforestation in the Amazon, 19 World Dev. 821, 823 (1991).
[7] See, Golbery do Couto e Silva, Aspectos Geopolticos do Brasil (1957). Return to text
A. M. Mattos, O Intersse Nacional e os Interesses Internacionais na Amazonia Brasileira, in Amaznia: Desenvolvimento ou Retrocesso 126 (J. M. Monteiro da Costa ed., 1992).
[8] See, (1989) (unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Indiana University). Return to text
O Indio Perante O Direito: Ensaios 12 (S. Coelho Santos ed., 1982
[9] Deforestation is known to contribute to run-off of rainfall and intensified soil erosion. The seriousness of the problem depends much on soil
characteristics and topography
[10] see, F. Terry Norris, “Where Did the Villages Go? Steamboats, Deforestation, and Archaeological Loss in the Mississippi Valley”, in Common Fields: an environmental history of St. Louis, Andrew Hurley, ed., St. Louis, MO: Missouri Historical Society Press, 1997, pp. 73-89
[11]See, Ron Nielsen, The Little Green Handbook: Seven Trends Shaping the Future of Our Planet, Picador, New York (2006)
[12] Cf. Norman Myers, Tropical Forests: Present Status and Future Outlook, Climatic Change, Sept. 1991, at 3, 17-18.
[13] This failure to take into account the budgetary consequences of legislation or constitutional law has been a persistent problem in Latin American history which accounts for the mismatch between the intentions of the law and its implementation.
[14] Note that the most recent treaties took place during the Rubber Boom Era (1880-1920) when Brazil was particularly successful in mobilizing its population to exploit wild rubber stands deep in the Amazon interior.
[15] By 1750 Brazil more than doubled its territory through the Treaty of Madrid which acknowledged the Portuguese occupation of what is today the bulk of Brazil’s territory. A number of later treaties further expanded Brazilian territory most of the time by their de facto occupation of a region, rather than by any legal claims to it.
[16] See, Golbery do Couto e Silva, Aspectos Geopolticos do Brasil (1957). P-113
[17] economic processes using standards mandated in the First World, or use the lower standards allowed, or overlooked by lax local enforcement in Third World countries
[18] As currently written, environmental laws in Latin America tend to be very general and philosophic and difficult to enforce.
[19] Chapter 26 of Agenda 21 foresees the need to support financially and legally the capacity of indigenous people to protect their territories from socially and environmentally unsound practices, and to use sustainably their lands. The declarations from Agenda 21 are very general, and will need to be specified for each place and each indigenous population. Some indigenous people represent populations in the tens of thousands and even hundreds of thousands, while others may have recently experienced devastating epidemics and represent only a few hundred individuals. For example, the Surui Indians in Rondonia experienced a loss of seventy-five percent of their population in one decade. Their low point, reached in 1978 was 322.
[20] The riverine agriculturalists, mostly Portuguese-speaking settlers, occupied the varzeas, the fertile flood plains, for permanent agriculture. This was possible because soil fertility was renewed annually during flooding. In 1990, the flood plains made up about 5 per cent of the Amazon’s areas and the flood plains included over half of all the land suitable for permanent agriculture. Their lifestyles were similar to the indigenous population, but unlike the indigenous population, they sold some crops, fish, jute, and the like to local traders
[21] . They used the money to buy necessities, such as tools, guns, and a few staples. Most of the people in this group, like the indigenous people practiced long fallow shifting agriculture and keep a few animals
[22] Gold prospectors brought diseases that soon wipe out most of the indigenous population. The mercury gold prospectors used to separate gold from sand polluted drinking water and fish.
[23] This affected fish reproductions, since most fish species depended on forest sources. Water reserves, hydrologic regime, soils and local climates, and agricultural productivity were also affected.
Correspondence
For: The Lawyers & Jurists
M.L.Hotel Tower Ltd,208,Shahid Syed Nazrul Islam Sarani,
Bijoy Nagar, Dhaka-1000.
Email-admin@lawyersnjurists.com/nomaer@hotmail.com
www.lawyersnjurists.com
Country code+ Ph No.
Ph:0088-02-9571389; 0088-02-9513408,
0088-02-9564329, 0088-02-9564398
Direct cell with country code:
Local Code :
a)0088-01733689444
b)0088-01674647033
C)0088-01552632768