UI Department of Forest Production Marks International day of Forests
“Imagine a world where people struggle to breathe! Imagine a world where the cool breeze we enjoy from trees around us are nowhere to be found again! Where thousands of different of tree species and plants become a history to be told, where our great grandchildren could only be shown pictures of many animals we see physically today, where the wood we use for buildings and furnitures becomes a thing of old and where we are short of medicine because we have eradicated shrubs and herbs which are the sources of most medicine we use today. Just imagine!
While thinking about that, here are the values and importance of forests, the reason why we should conserve our forests, and use them sustainably.
Forests are vital to lives on earth, they purify the air we breathe, forests prevent erosion and runoff of soil nutrients by reducing force of rainfall on the ground and the rate at which water move through the ground.
Forests act as an important buffer against climate change, you may ask why, forests is known as the bank of carbondioxide which is a major gas among greenhouse gases that cause global warming that leads to climate change,
Forests sequester carbon through photosynthesis and give off Oxygen which is useful for human respiration.
Forest serves as an habitat for much of the diverse plants and animals in the world, it provides shelter for many large animals and humans. Not only that, Forest provide essential natural resources from timber and food to medicinal plants. If there is no forest, there wouldn’t be food and shelter for humans, even no one will live.
Instead of us to maintain and use these forests sustainably, we have reduced greatly the area these forests covered in the past 10 years, the forests are under threat, despite the key role forests take in the world environmental and economic health.
In 2020, the tropics lost more than 12 million hectares of tree cover, we continue to lose forest along with endangered and threatened animals that live in them. Humans continue to increase in population, and more people require more houseolds, more houseolds require clearing of forests resulting to felling of thousands of trees and reduction in the area covered by the forests.
Many people clear forest for agriculture purposes because increase in our population demands more food, to get more food, more lands for agriculture is needed, then we tend to decrease forest cover as we continue to cut more trees. Unsustainable logging by those who need timber and wood for consumption purpose also add to decrease of the forest cover. We continue to loot these forests without planting trees back, we need to wake up before we finish these forests.
For the sake of our great grandchildren, we can all restore all the forests we have lost by planting trees through afforestation of already barren land, we can plant trees around our abodes, when you cut a tree, make sure you plant 10 trees to replace it. Forests are what we depend on for our survival, the food we eat, the clothes we wear, the shoes we wear even the medicine we take are all forest products. The future starts today, let’s take action.
Babalola Taofeek
