LookAtVietnam – The Central Highland province of Dak Nong is rapidly losing large tracts of tropical forests, with rangers struggling to cope with increasingly illegal loggers.

An agricultural worker prepares seeds for planting in a forest at the Nam Nung Nature Reserve in the Tay Nguyen (Central Highlands) province of Dak Nong.

Sixty cases involving dozens of people have been prosecuted out of over 1,300 cases, mostly in the districts of Krong No, Dak Song, Tuy Duc, and Dak Glong.

But the deforestation is actually happening on a greater scale, not fully reflected by official statistics.

The most vulnerable areas are located on borders with other provinces where officials’ responsibilities are not clearly defined and forests are inhabited by migrant slash-and-burn farmers.

Even closely-guarded national parks and conservation areas like Nam Cat Tien, Ta Dung, and Nam Nung are beginning to be violated.

Le Van Quang, deputy chairman of the Tuy Duc District People’s Committee, said conservation work is complicated by the vast areas and difficult terrains involved and massive migration by people in search of arable land.

Violent loggers

“A recent rash of violent assaults on forest guards has made their job more dangerous than ever,” Quang added.

Illegal loggers are found apparently better co-ordinated with multiple layers of scouts equipped with walkie-talkies to sound an early alarm.

If apprehended, they are ready to take on the forests guards.

Last November, around 30 loggers in Tuy Duc District used electric saws to seriously injure a guard and beat up three others with sticks, sending the rest bolting for safety.

Last December, also in Tuy Duc, more than 40 loggers armed with axes and knives audaciously chased Quang Tin Forestry Company’s guards back to their station.

The brigands then besieged the station until rescuers arrived. It was the fifth attack on guards in the last three years, according to Than Van Minh, the company’s director.

Causes and solutions

Do Ngoc Duyen, head of Dak Nong’s Forestry Department, attributed the illegal logging to a lack of staff and resources plaguing many companies that have leased the forests.

Some of them even closed down, leaving huge areas of forest to the mercy of illegal loggers.

Duyen said that while local communes are tasked with protecting forests, their rights and responsibilities are not spelled out, leaving authorities hesitant when it came to taking action.

The co-ordination between the police, forest guards, and army is fitful and usually ineffective, while penalties for offenders are not deterrent enough, he said.

He blamed the rises in prices of coffee, rubber, pepper, corn, cassava, and other agricultural products for the massive clearing of forests for farming those crops.

The Dak Nong People’s Committee has asked various agencies - including the military, militia, police, and forest guards - to crack down on illegal loggers, especially along the border.

It said it is imperative to relocate illegal migrants living in forests and punish them for clearing forests.

The re-allocation of forests to communal authorities would be accelerated and deforested areas seized for regreening, it added.

Dak Nong, 230km to the north-west of HCM City, has a forest area of 325,000ha, or 60 per cent of its total area, making it one of the greenest provinces in the country.

VietNamNet/Viet Nam News