Thai gov't to spend nearly US$1bn on forest restoration
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E-mail Xinhua, February 29, 2012
The Thai government has put forest rehabilitation and preservation on the national agenda by allocating about 99 million U.S. dollars to regenerate land over the next five years, the Bangkok Post reported on Tuesday.
The decision was made in a meeting of top officials from all ministries concerned chaired by Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra on Monday at the Forest Department.
The move follows King Bhumibol Adulyadej's advice given to members of the Strategic Formulation Committee for Reconstruction and Future Development (SCRF) and the Strategic Formulation Committee for Water Resource Management during an audience on Friday last week.
The King expressed his concern about deforestation and blamed it for contributing to the seriousness of last year's flooding.
The Department of National Park, Wildlife and Plant Conservation will spend more than 66 million U.S. dollars to reforest 6,400 million square meters of land.
"We never seriously put forest rehabilitation on the national agenda before," the Bangkok Post quoted Damrong Pidech, director- general of the Department of National Parks, Wildlife and Plant Conservation as saying.
Suwit Rattanamanee, chief of the Royal Forest Department, said its 1 billion baht budget would cover the forest ecology system recovery, 11,000 man-made water retention areas and 19,000 dykes, along with forest preservation and protection training programs.
Prime Minister Yingluck also ordered Natural Resources and Environment Minister Preecha Rengsomboonsuk to look into increasing punishments for forest encroachment.
During July-December last year, Thailand faced the worst-flood crisis in nearly 50 years, which killed more than 800 people and affected more than 10 million people.
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