As a country, Bangladesh is still quite in-development when you consider the rate of urbanization, and with a rapidly growing urban population that nation is understandably expected to continue its urbanization schemes.
However, it is incredibly worrying that our development is coming at the cost of our natural beauty for no real reasons as a war against trees and greenery has ostensibly taken root in the past decade with both the private and public sector waging it.
To that end, two recent incidents point to this worrying trend: The construction of several buildings at Jahangirnagar University (JU) which has seen hundreds of trees being felled, and the felling of nearly 5,000 trees in a five-acre forest area in Chittagong’s Tulatoli in order to make way for a ship-breaking yard.
According to news reports, JU teachers and students claim that trees are being cut down as the buildings have been constructed in an unplanned manner, and have been staging a movement over the last five years for a master plan to construct buildings. While more than 200 trees are likely to be felled in order to construct additional buildings, the process is also witnessing an entire body of water being completely filled up.
On the same page, in Chittagong, the Forest Department has been fighting a losing battle as it has challenged the legal status of the land lease agreement between the district administration and Kohinoor Steel which is trying to set up the ship-breaking yard in Tulatoli.
To say that this is disheartening would be an understatement.
When the government itself sets the precedent for felling trees indiscriminately, it is hardly surprising when businesses and other institutions also start picking up on this troubling practice -- it was not that long ago when the Dhaka South City Corporation justified clearing an entire strip of Dhanmondi of trees for the purposes of beautification.
