Just a pledge to end deforestation isn’t enough
The pledge by world leaders at COP26 to end deforestation by 2030 has been met with scepticism by environmental groups across the world, with Greenpeace describing it as a green light for "another decade of deforestation." Given that the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report said, in unequivocal terms, that human-induced climate change had reached unprecedented levels and has already had impacts that are "irreversible" for centuries, and that the UN chief has called this situation a "code red for humanity," it would not be amiss to suggest that far more urgent actions are required.
While it is a step in the right direction that countries like Brazil and Russia, who have been singled out for accelerating deforestation in their territories, have agreed to sign this pledge, environmentalists argue that the world simply does not have the time to wait and see if these countries will stick to their promises. In fact, a similar declaration had already been issued once at a UN climate gathering in New York in 2014, where it was promised that the rate of deforestation would be halved by 2020, and it would end by 2030. However, the grim reality is that no such thing has happened; in fact, deforestation surged in Brazil in 2020, leading to a 9.5 percent increase in its emissions.
In Bangladesh, the situation is no less dire. In March this year, the Transparency International Bangladesh (TIB) cited UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) data in a report, which revealed that the annual deforestation rate in Bangladesh was almost double the global average of 2.6 percent. In the last 17 years, about 66 square-kilometres of tropical rainforests have been destroyed in Bangladesh, and 287,453 acres of forest land has been occupied all over the country. According to the TIB, the misuse of power by the Forest Department and the collusion and incompetence of a section of officials in forest-centric corruption is one of the major obstacles to stopping deforestation and protecting biodiversity in Bangladesh.
We, like every other country in the world, cannot be lax about taking strong and immediate action to end deforestation. Unplanned development activities on forest land, construction of coal-fired power plants near reserved forests, allotment of land around forests for construction of public and private industries and establishments, and corruption and encroachment of forest land are all issues that we need to resolve urgently.
But we cannot do it alone. Almost a quarter of all man-made emissions of carbon dioxide can be attributed to land use activity such as logging, deforestation, and farming, and a majority of this occurs in the developed world, while countries like Bangladesh feel its impacts. We urge world leaders to put forward a comprehensive plan towards ending deforestation, as well as commit to providing loss and damage funding to countries that have felt the worst repercussions of mass deforestation and human-induced climate change.
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