Urban Forestry: A strong case for restoring ecological balance

There is an urgent need for improving Urban Forestry. Whatever is lost must be restored and whatever remains must be preserved.

Lung Space - Cubbon Park





An Urban Forest plays a significant role in enhancing our natural environment and restoring the fast depleting ecological balance of our burgeoning Metropolitan cities.  Areas which were once native to eco-life - trees, birds, bees, little animals now jostle for space with concrete structures struggling to come to terms with reality, loss of home and micro-climate of its existance.

We need development, We are  reponsible for the rampant destruction. We must act - act before it is too late.

Or is it already too late?

Sample these statistics:..

 

80 year old Banyan Tree Felled at
Bettadasapura, near Electronics City to lay a road


• The figures of the central Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) reveal that Karnataka has the highest percentage of encroachment of national parks in south India-five national parks have lost nearly 685.61 hectare (1,694 acre) over the past five years. Nearly 750 acre (303 hectare) of reserved forest in Bannerghatta National Park area has been infringed upon by industrialists. Out of this, 482.32 hectare (1,191 acre) has been encroached upon over the past five years.
• Nearly 1,000 acres of land was found to be illegally occupied in the reseve forests surrounding Bangalore (extended) city areas.
• Number of lakes in Bangalore has come down from 159 to only 93. Strangely, the BBMP claims there are still 212 lakes in the City

• A recent study by the Indian Institute Of Science’s centre for ecological sciences (CES) shows that there has been a growth of 632% in urban areas Bangalore. This has come by significantly eating into green-belt areas.
• Among other regions, 281 sq km of forest cover lost in AP in the last two years
  encroachment in Assam's Kaziranga National Park, where nearly 7,790 hectare is illegally occupied
  In Arunachal Pradesh, nearly 3,005 hectare has been lost at Namdapha National Park.

These statistics are from studies, reasearch papers sponsored by either NGOs or Gov'ts agencies. That apart, each of us can do our bit to try and restore the damage.





I read a slogan - "Each One - Plant One". If each one of us, at least in the 4 Southern Indian states was to plant a tree, it would amount to about 25 crore trees; imagine all India... that would be about 25 lakh hectares of green cover for 1.22 billion people!  India could have its own rainforest, comparable or even surpassing our precious Western Ghats.

But is it just that simple? Can we just plant tree-saplings and be happy that we did our might and rest assured that the ecological balance will help itself? Think again! ...