CHITRAL: In the absence of alternative heat sources for cooking and heating, the residents are using oak wood in southern Chitral for fuel and thus, threatening forests.

The surveys conducted by different organisations including German kfW showed that the consumption of firewood by every household in Chitral was 20kg daily in the winter season and 10kg in the summer season with the total consumption by 57,000 households coming to 50,400 tons a year.

The commercial use of the wood by hotels, ovens and offices is not included in it.

Civil society activists call for supply of cheap electricity to people

The surveys also disclosed that 60 percent of the wood was oak’s, which was extracted from the forests, while the natural regeneration of oak had never been enough to recuperate the fallen trees due to dry weather conditions.

The Chitral Forest Division insisted that the average extraction of firewood of oak from the forests during the five years (from 2012 to 2016) was 31,000 tons and that didn’t include the localised collection.

The residents said due to its high heat content, oak was the most preferred species of firewood and that every year, thousands of trees of oaks were removed from their natural habitat to meet the needs of the entire district.

They said the depletion ofoakpopulation started with the arrival of Afghan refugees in the early 1980s as they harvested it for their own use and earning as well and the practice continued unabated for two decades.

The residents added that the introduction of modern gadgets and construction of roads into the forests had accelerated the process.

Haji Manzoor, owner of a wood stall in Chitral town, said until the end of 1990s, the oak trees were chopped down by people and brought to the main road on the back of mules for onward transportation to the market.

He said over the last two decades, petrol machine-powered chain saws had been used, which took 10 to 15 minutes to cut down a tree, while the roads had been constructed to the upper most part of forests.

Regarding the natural life of anoaktree, he said it takes about one hundred years to be become mature for harvesting while during the course of ruthless cutting; the growing plants were also cut down, and the newly germinatingoaksaplings were trampled upon.

He said the price ofoakwoodhad increased many times.

“In 2008, a maund (40 kg) ofoakwoodwas sold for Rs160 but the price currently stands at Rs550,” he said.

Hamid Ahmed Mir, a conservationist working with international organisation, said the soil erosion and environmental degradation are the natural consequences of the recedingoaktrees in the forests.

He said the regularphenomenon of mud flood in the valleys of Bumburate, Birir, Rumbur, Sheshi Koh, Arandu, Damil and Arsoon during the last ten years have devastated the valleys where oak forests had been disturbed.

Civil society activists called for the supply of cheap electricity to people for domestic use to replace the use of oak wood for heating and cooking.

Chairman of the Chitral Community Development Network Sartaj Ahmed Khan said in order to save the environment from degradation, the government should provide electricity for domestic consumption on Re1 per unit from the newly-constructed Golen Gol hydropower station.

Published in Dawn, November 16th, 2018