Humans: The Ungrateful Children of the Forest
Maruf Hossain
31 July,2023
Trees
are the first and foremost component of nature which is serving human being
existence from the very beginning of the birth of this planet. According to the
research of archeologists and ecologists, from the dawn of civilization when
human didn’t come to existence still that period trees were playing their role
for the sake of wildlife . In primitive times, people used to worship trees in
large numbers which is still have been followed by many civilizations,
communities and religions. In midway many civilizations are demolished through
natural calamities and their own communal conflict but a few are still alive
and carrying on their religious beliefs. Example includes "Banyan Tree" which is a sacred figure tree to Hindus. This is also called as “Vatbriksha” and
also recognized as India’s national tree. Examples also includes Bible
where the Bible story begins in a garden where God and humans live
together and in the garden a top place which is a very sacred place looks like
a giant tree and the holy of holies ,where Gods
presence is most intense etc.
Now, the question is why most of the religions gave the highest place of respect to trees even in worship? The answer is very simple . Firstly, Trees are the lungs of the earth and also they are the root of existence of every creature. We know that all the creatures living in earth depends on Oxygen, food and shelter which we are provided by trees. Secondly, there will be no existence of living being without trees. Its a matter of concern that global warming is increasing rapidly and its obviously human created disaster we are facing right now . But the circumstances and the facts discussed all above has gone in vain as trees are not planted at an adequate level in last 5 decades.
For instance, excessive use
of air conditioner or CFC gas, emissions of carbon gas in high level, not
adopting the green technology in corporate offices and factories, extensive uses
of unrenewable energy and lastly the main reason cutting down trees randomly. Nasa report says, “According
to an ongoing
temperature analysis led by scientists at NASA’s Goddard
Institute for Space Studies (GISS), the average global temperature on Earth has
increased by at least 1.1°
Celsius (1.9° Fahrenheit) since 1880.”
Its crystal clear from this report that global warming is rising day by day at
an alarming rate. Still ,we were looking all over the world but what if we
think about the situation of Bangladesh our own country which is most densely
populated country with most polluted environment? Bangladesh has already
experienced the warmest heatwave in last 60 years throughout the country and
besides Bangladesh capital Dhaka has witnessed
the hottest day this year 2023 in
comparison to last 58 years. According to The DailyStar, "Official data shows
that Bangladesh only has 17.62
percent of its landmass
covered by forests, which only points to the fact that it is near-impossible to
achieve the government aim to stop deforestation by 2020 and have 20 percent of the landmass covered by forests by 2030 with 70 percent tree density as per the SDGs.” From the tiny development of
recent infrastructure of Bangladesh for nature friendly environment it can be
assured that Bangladesh is not still on the way to achieve SDG 13 by 2030 (sustainable Development Goals) which is
named as “Climate Action”. Bangladesh poor infrastructures, faulty civil mapping, lack of proper plan execution of land and survey department and lastly lack of adequate knowledge of mass
people are the main reasons behind deforestation and nature safety issues. If
we talk about Dhaka the capital of
Bangladesh which is the 2nd worst polluted city in world has no
nature safety issues left actually . We
can assure this by seeing the poor mapping and infrastructure support of Dhaka city where
a few road dividers, Govt colonies and highways have got adequate amount of trees Otherwise, trees are not
available in that much amount in densely populated localities whereas there are
only gigantic buildings and apartments . To illustrate, in many areas
of Dhaka we can catch the sight of small trees very close to apartment
area sides planted for beauty purpose but I doubt how much people are conscious
about global warming. The owners of the buildings and VIP societies never
consider the space for trees amongst their rising buildings whereas in
other
countries they always make
a separate place for trees and parks. The new urbanization and growing cities
outside Bangladesh have already understood the
importance of tree plantation as well as they have taken many
initiatives for greenery like green architecture also known as "UrbanForestry”. This new initiative includes green infrastructure like "green buildings" which main concept is to make a place for nature and trees amongst the rising
buildings and densely populated areas which will help balancing ecosystem.
Moreover, they have taken many unique steps regarding greenery like filling
empty footpaths and streets
with different trees and creeping fig which will help to reduce heat of any
particular area as well as it will help to increase the beauty of roads also. I
strongly believe , new green urbanization and greenery will help reducing
carbon di oxide and pollution day by day if
this step is taken from every corner of the world. Until trees are alive ,the
whole nature will survive and as the nature survives human beings will continue
to their existence.
“When the
last tree is cut down, the last fish is eaten and the last stream is poisoned,
you will realize that you can not eat money.”
Comments
Post a Comment