VietNamNet Bridge – The deputy head of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development's Directorate of Forestry, Ha Cong Tuan, spoke to Dai Doan Ket (Great Unity) newspaper about illegal logging activities.

Illegal logging is attributed as being one of major reasons for the floods in the central region this year. What is your assessment of this opinion?

It is true that illegal logging has worsened the situation. Forest loss causes erosion and makes water run faster. Forests in the central region have been reduced over the years, mainly due to the building of hydro-electricity and irrigation projects. So it's not true to say illegal logging is complete to blame for the recent floods and in the central region, but of course, fewer forests mean more serious floods.

How have the forests been lost?

About 230,000ha of woodland has been planted this year. The country also lost 80,000ha of forests, mainly due to timber. Specifically, about 60,000ha of forest has been cut down to produce more than 4 million cubic metres of timber; with the land assigned to the building of hydroelectricity and irrigation projects. Fires also burnt down over 5,000ha of forest.

What measures have been taken to protect forests?

The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development has outlined a forest management project during 2011-15 with vision until 2020.

Under the project, the ministry has focused on forest planning, raising the duties and rights of forest owners, organising the formation of forest rangers at the grassroot level in combination with responsibilities for each locality.

Besides this, it will soon present the Government ‘leverage' policies for sustainable forest protection. About 200,000ha of new forest will be planted each year from now until 2015. The ministry will also advise the Government to strengthen the allocation of forested land and support ethnic people to shift from slash-and-burn farming to forest growing.

The Government has also incorporated the 2011-15 forest protection programme as a national target. Guidance documents have been issued to relevant agencies to affirm development targets and issue policies to encourage forest growers.

What is your assessment of forest protection work in localities, especially at the grassroots level? Have the ministry introduced new forest protection measures there?

Every province, district and commune will be given devolved responsibility to protect forests. A new policy proposes to allocate a sum of money to each commune to help it organise militiamen and pay them for forest protection. We think it is a breakthrough policy because communes have devolved responsibility to protect forests already but the Government has not yet supported them in man and capital to do so previously.

We have issued strong warnings to officials or dismissed them for a lack of responsibility in letting illegal logging happen. But we should address the root of the problem through balancing rights with responsibilities. We also agree with a common opinion that forest rangers should act at the grassroots level to support communal People's Committee chairmen and militiamen engaged in forestry protection. Strict inspections should also be conducted to uncover illegal loggers.

Attacks on forest rangers have continued to happen. Is this because the existing sanctions aren't harsh enough?

This is a complicated issue. Forest rangers alone cannot solve the problem by themselves. The issue needs joint efforts of various sectors at different levels. In many cases, forest rangers were attacked because they underestimated the danger of illegal loggers and lacked professionalism. So the ministry will continue training forest rangers and providing technology to help them prevent forest fires, and improve reports on violations. But more crucially, forest rangers need to purge their employees of poor quality members to ensure they have committed staff.

The ministry will also release an amended decision on forest management in January.

VietNamNet/Viet Nam News