Minister calls for reforestation to step up climate resilience

ISLAMABAD: Senator Mushahidullah Khan, Federal Minister for Climate Change, on Tuesday said that all-out efforts are being made to boost Pakistan’s climate resilience by re-vitalising forestry sector. 

“If our forests continue to be chopped down at the current pace, we will never be able to protect the country from the devastating effects of global warming-induced climate change,” Khan told a national consultative meeting on the World Bank-sponsored programme “REED+ (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation) at a local hotel.

“Forests are the best way to increase climate resilience against the adverse effects of the climate change impacts.”

The minister informed the meeting the international studies have shown that deforestation and land degradation accounts for a major share in overall global carbon emissions annually. 

“Most people assume that global warming is caused by burning oil, gas and coal. But in fact between 25 and 30 percent of the greenhouse gases released into the atmosphere each year or estimated 1.6 billion tons of carbon dioxide – is caused by deforestation, mainly the cutting and burning of forests, every year,” Khan elaborated. 

However, he continued, the same amount of climate-altering carbon dioxide released from fossil fuel burning through any source could be removed from the atmosphere to minimise the climate change by halting deforestation. 

“The trees are 50 percent carbon. But when they are chopped down or burned, the carbon dioxide they store makes its way back into the air,” said the minister quoting studies of the UN’s Food and Agriculture (FAO).

In the next breath, he said that apart from that, around 13 million hectares of forests worldwide are lost annually, almost entirely in the tropics, most of it occurs in Africa, Latin America and Southeast Asia. 

“An ambitious World Bank-funded $3.8 million REDD+ programme has already been launched in the country that will help the owners to access money for forest protection and controlling their shrinkage,” the climate change minister told the participants. 

He pointed out that lack of access to energy for cooking and heating in households, illegal cutting of trees, population growth, and associated surge in the demand, changes in land cover for non-forestry uses, land erosion and degradation are among major causes of deforestation in the country. 

“Controlling deforestation in the country is not possible without increasing access to renewable and alternative energy sources, particularly for cooking and heating in households,”, he said adding, “Reducing occurrence of land erosion and landslides by strengthening forested
mountain slopes with vegetation cover and increasing public awareness about positive effects of forests on overall environment, human health and biodiversity.” 

The minister also urged the provincial and federal representatives of the forest departments to join the climate change ministry’s efforts for implanting national forest policy that aims to halt deforestation and inject new life in the ailing forestry sector. 

The event was attended by forest experts from different countries and from different parts of the country, who discussed various technical and policy options to boost country’s tree cover as a part of the country’s climate resilience efforts.