Kenyan President William Ruto on Sunday announced the lifting of a nearly six-year-old ban on logging, despite concerns from environmental groups.
Ruto said the “long-awaited” decision was aimed at creating jobs and developing sectors of the economy that depend on forest products.
“We cannot have mature trees rotting in the forests while people are suffering from lack of wood. This is madness,” the president said at a church service in Molo, a town about 200 kilometers away. northwest of Nairobi, the capital.
“That’s why we decided to open the forest and harvest wood, in order to create jobs for our young people and open businesses,” he added.
Ruto, who has positioned himself at the forefront of African efforts to tackle climate change, assured that the government is sticking to its target of planting 15 billion trees over the next 10 years.
The lifting of the ban will rejoice the sawmill and timber trade sectors, which lamented that it had caused many job losses.
The moratorium was imposed by the previous government in February 2018, in public and community forests, to eradicate endemic illegal logging and increase the country’s forest cover to 10%.
For Greenpeace Africa, its lifting risks having “catastrophic environmental consequences”.
“In Kenya, forests are home to rare and endangered species, and millions of people depend on these forests for their livelihoods, for food and medicine,” the NGO warned last month, as part of a petition. thrown against this raise.
“Since the Kenyan government imposed the logging ban six years ago, significant progress has been made in protecting forests and tackling the climate crisis,” she added.
“Removing the ban will undo all our hard work, as it will open the floodgates to commercial and illegal logging, solely driven by profit,” according to the NGO.
Logging contributed 1.6% of Kenya’s GDP in 2022, where forests covered 8.8% of the territory, according to government statistics.
7/2/2023 20:20:27 – Nairobi (AFP) – © 2023 AFP
