Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra said in her weekly "Yingluck government meets the people" TV programme that her government would heed His Majesty the King's advice given to members of the Strategic Formulation Committee for Water Resources Management during an audience at Siriraj hospital on Friday.
The stumps of felled payung trees at the Phu Jong-Na Yoi National Park in Ubon Ratchathani bear grim witness to illegal logging. Villagers in Na Chaluai, Buntharik and Nam Yuen districts, where the park is located, accused local state officials of colluding with a major illegal logging gang in destroying the forest.
During the audience, the King expressed his concern about deforestation and blamed it for contributing to the seriousness of last year's flooding and also the severity and increasing frequency of landslides, especially in the North. He blamed greedy civil servants for allowing illegal logging to persist and urged the government to take punitive actions to stem deforestation.
On reforestation, HM the King advised the cultivation of both fast-growing and slow-growing tree species, pointing out that the slow-growing trees will help prevent landslides because their roots pierce deeper into the ground and firmly hold the surface soil.
This was not the first time that the King has talked about deforestation and its resulting problems of flooding, drought and landslides and stressed the need to stop deforestation as well as the need for reforestation to recoup the lost forest cover. Her Majesty the Queen has also highlighted similar needs on various occasions.
The real problem is that all governments in the past have ignored the advice or, at best, given it a half-hearted response. And this is not at all an exaggeration or a biased finger-pointing exercise.
Not a single government has been genuinely serious about protecting the forests because in the mindset of most government leaders forests are just trees which, when chopped down by whoever, can be replaced with new trees. They simply do not understand that forests are more than trees and their commercial value but a treasury of biodiversity aside from being a natural sponge which can help prevent or reduce the risk of flooding and drought. That explains why the "big fish" who are responsible for illegal logging or who have paid the poor to encroach on forests and chop down all the trees, and then to reclaim the denuded forests, have rarely been caught, let alone prosecuted or punished.
How can this rampant illegal logging take place without the notice or intervention of the authorities concerned? You can guess by yourself. Or you can get the answer from our beloved King who hit the nail right in the head when he blamed greedy officials for being part and parcel of the illegal activities.
The "I don't give a damn" attitude towards the forests by successive governments in the past is clearly reflected in the "chicken feed" budget allocated each year for forest protection and reforestation. That is why so often that we have heard complaints from authorities concerned that they were short of manpower and budget to effectively police all the forests against the poachers. Many of the forest rangers are still equipped with antiquated shotguns against the poachers' rifles or assault rifles. I just hope that the Yingluck government will be different from the past governments and will genuinely heed the King's advice through deeds and not mere words.
To begin with, the government's plan to reforest 300,000 rai of denuded or degraded forests in the North needs to be adjusted because the size of the land involved is far too small and not in proportion to the size of forests poached each year. At this rate of just 300,000 rai, we will never recoup our forests fast enough.
Of the 350 billion baht earmarked for the water resources management plan, more money should be set aside for the reforestation scheme. There should be no excuse why this cannot be done if the government has realised the importance of forests in flood prevention and drought relief. Many of us may have forgotten what PTT did in 1997 as a tribute to the King on the occasion of the 50th year of his accession to the throne. Named "reforestation by heart, and plant the hearts of forest lovers", PTT volunteered to plant an area of one million rai to honour the King on the auspicious occasion.
As advised by the King, fast-growing and slow-growing trees should be planted. And I hope that the reforested plots will not turn into rubber plantations.
Besides reforestation, what needs to be done concurrently is that the government must deal more harshly and seriously with forest poachers, especially the "big fish" and not the poor landless farmers. To do so, the government must address the problem of the shortage of manpower and funds in departments tasked with safeguarding the forests. Equally important is the need to involve local people and their participation both in forest protection and in reforestation schemes.
Veera Prateepchaikul is a former editor, Bangkok Post.