Preserve our natural forests
IT is currently tree-planting campaigns time again in South Africa.
As everyone may understand by now, it is that period when all must celebrate the importance of natural forests and trees in our troubled environment.
Annually, September has been earmarked as a month dedicated to tree-planting and celebrating forests in our country.
The practice started in Nebraska in America, but was embraced worldwide due to the value trees and forests have in the existence of mankind.
In South Africa it started in 1970 as Arbor Day, but a previous minister of Water Affairs and Forestry, Kader Asmal, dedicated the first week of September to tree-planting – Arbor Week.
Nelson Mandela metro at its Arbor Week activity in Uitenhage declared the whole month Arbor Month.
The campaign is currently led by the national Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries.
As an official of the department in Port Elizabeth, I call on communities blessed with natural forests, such as Ndlambe, Makana, Nelson Mandela metro, Kouga and the Garden Route areas of Knysna, George, etc, to protect and preserve their natural heritages that include the forests.
Local authorities in the mentioned areas with coastal villages are warned to beware of wealthy developers who relocate to these areas posing as nature lovers because of the sea resorts and forests, only to turn the environment artificial.
Our towns along the coast will in the near future lose what essentially attracted these developers in the first place.
The developers and owners of holiday homes inadvertently do this by purchasing forest-covered properties, and start developments that turn forests into golf estates, horse stables, cluster developments, coastal villages, etc.
While the country needs economic development, we should also be careful not to allow reckless development to turn once beautiful environments into artificial wonderlands.
Local authorities are advised not to approve development without requisite environmental impact assessments (EIAs) that would ensure that all relevant legislation had been complied with.
Without EIAs, or EIAs that do not take into account any of the laws, in particular the National Forest Act, developments are legally invalid.
The advice also applies to farmers who aspire to change land use from natural forest to crop farming.
The department grants licences to clear forests for certain activities like building houses, access roads, etc, but these are limited as forests are a rare biome and therefore strictly protected.
Such licences are applied for and are granted with conditions.
Property owners who acquire plots covered with forests are required to apply for licences even though the plots are on areas zoned residential.
Fortunately, local authorities and individuals in South Africa are aware of this requirement, but a large portion of the population is still not aware.
Communities in the drier Karoo areas were called upon to plant trees to beautify the landscape and improve the environment in general.
Let us celebrate our forests and trees by protecting them and planting more.
Thabo Nokoyo, Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, Port Elizabeth