Strict laws can make people grow their own trees: Herman Borg

CARTAGENA, Colombia: Herman Borg is a missionary hailing from Germany but based in Subukia, Kenya for many decades. Nicknamed ‘Baba Miti’ in the local language meaning ‘Father of Trees’, he has a unique distinction of being an agent of a major environmental change in this area-and it’s definitely a positive one. With his dedication and inspirational skills, he has reversed the clock and to a great extent undone the damages done to the local environs.

When he came to Subukia in the early 1980s, it was a rocky and barren land and there was no forest cover at all-something prompting locals to migrate to other areas to settle down and find livelihood. This lack of natural resources had adversely impacted the pace of development in Subukia.

There were hardly any schools, health facilities or natural water supplies mainly due to the lack of precipitation. But today he walks with his head high for a feat commended by a large number of individuals and organisations around the world. During this week, he was invited to the 28th International Congress for Conservation Biology 2017 (ICCB 2017) organised by the Society for Conservation Biology (SCB). Here he was conferred an award for making communities in Subukia plant one million trees over a period of 30 years.

Doesn’t this seem familiar to the ears of Pakistanis? Yes, it does as they have been hearing about the billion tree tsunami project carried out in country by the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI)-led Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) government. The government’s plan was to plant one billion trees in the province over a period of a couple of years.

Talking to The News here in Cartagena, Borg said though this claim of a political government might be an exaggerated one, the good thing was that there was a realisation in Pakistan to go for large scale tree plantation. Referring to his experience, he said the key to success lies in the involvement of communities in such initiatives and suggested Pakistan to follow this model.

“You make and enforce strict laws without discrimination and stop logging at existing forests; people will grow their own trees to meet their demands.” He said this was exactly what happened in Kenya. The government there fenced forests and no one could go there to cut trees, therefore communities started planting their own.

Borg said religious inspiration to protect creations of God was also there and this could be a case in Pakistan as well, where people were religious. He heads an organisation Mother Earth which creates awareness on environmental issues.

He has invested just $50,000 in planting one million saplings over the past 30 years, but today the worth of these trees was more than $5 million. In Subukia, precipitation has increased, natural channels are flushing with water and migration has come to a halt. Now there are schools where students are taught to go for conservation and tree plantation from the very beginning.

Borg’s model has been replicated in neighbouring regions by others also, taking the number to five million trees. Kenya had around 45 percent forest cover a hundred years ago, which came down to four percent and it is now around seven percent. “Pakistan’s forest cover I have heard is even less than 3 percent. It must go all to reverse the situation,” he concluded.