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VietNamNet Bridge – It would be a nice surprise to everyone that a mature
forest has existed for the last many generations and staying safe from illegal
loggers. It is the local residents, with rudimentary weapons and the strong
will, who have been protecting the “green gold mine”.
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The “green gold mine”
Located in the commune of the farthest mountainous district of Quang Ngai province, but the Trut forest is just six kilometers far from the Di Lang – Tra Trung transport route, and there is a road for cars to drive people to the place.
As the forest is located on a transport-convenient position, the intact existence of the hundreds of hectares of the Trut forest for the last many generations would be a nice surprise to everyone.
While many other forests in Vietnam have become devastated, since people, with bottomless cupidity, want more and more precious timber to build their houses, have been trying to steal hardwood. Despite the efforts by state agencies, the forests have still been devastated, because the profits the precious wood can bring are high enough to encourage evildoers to chop down precious wood.
There, at the Trut forest, one can see numberless trees, big and small, including precious timber such as ironwood, which people think now only can exist in deep forests or has got nearly depleted. A lot of big trees, with different sizes, have been staying imposingly, blocking the shade. Small trees have the tree-trunks equal to one person’s arm. Meanwhile, big trees should be taken in 5-7 people’s arms.
If going further into the forest, about 20 kilometers from the forest’s edge, one can see a green ironwood tree with the estimated height of 25 meters with the tree-trunks so big that even 12 people could not hug it.
However, Ho Van The, a local resident, said that the 25 meters-high tree is quite popular at the forest. “There are even bigger trees there,” he said.
According to Nguyen Huu Quan, 57, a timber expert in Quang Ngai City, such a big tree must have the age of 500-700 years old, and that the tree would be valued at no less than 600 million dong.
Meanwhile, there is not only one big tree; there are thousands such trees existing at the Trut forest.
The “forest genie” in the modern times
While many people have been trying to devastate trees to get precious timber, the seven households in Xanh hamlet, Tra Trung Commune of Tay Tra district have been guarding the Trut forest, day and night. They simply think that they need to protect the forest, so that the animals can have places to live and they do not have to leave. They need to protect the trees for birds to perch and nest, and they need to protect the streams in the forests, so that the stream can always provide clean water.
Ho Van Ba, 71, the village patriarch, related that in the war with American, he once saw American aircraft flying above the forest; he tried to fire to drive them away, because he feared the aircrafts would spread toxic substance to kill the forest.
A surprising thing here is that though local residents are guarding a “gold mine” with thousands of kinds of precious timber, their houses are made of low quality wood.
“If I chop down trees to make houses, others people will follow me. If so, there will not be precious timber in the forest any more,” Ba said.
The 32 local residents are really poor, but none of them thinks of chopping down the trees for sale for money.
“H”, who once a well known illegal logger in Son Ha district, who has given up his job, said that he once came to meet the local residents, offering 200 million dong to them and ask for the permission to chop down the precious timber, but the local residents said “no”.
To date, no illegal logger has been able to chop down wood and successfully carrying wood out of the forest and the Trut forest has been safe and sound.
Source: Zing
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