Parliament Votes to Ban Commercial Exploitation of Northern Forests' Wood

Members of parliament have banned commercial and industrial exploitation of wood from the northern forests of Iran. According to Fars News Agency, on Thursday, January 13, the Iranian parliament voted on Article 48 of the Sixth Development Plan, prohibiting 'any commercial and industrial exploitation of wood from the northern forests of the country starting from the beginning of the fourth year of the plan.' According to this resolution, 'the government will not be allowed to extend contracts for the forestry projects whose execution period has expired.' This article also obligates the government to 'take action to amend those forestry projects whose execution period does not end by the end of the third year of the Sixth Development Plan according to the law.' According to the first note of this article, collection and exploitation aimed at 'health, protection, and cultivation of forests from old, dead standing, fallen, non-renewable, and pest-infested trees' is only permitted with the permission of the Forests Organization. The second note of this article also states that the harvesting of forest trees for the implementation of approved and permitted construction projects is allowed with the permission of the Forests, Rangelands, and Watershed Organization. On January 8, during the review of the details of the Sixth Development Plan, parliament had also obligated the government to restore 850,000 hectares of the country's forests during the Sixth Development Plan. According to officials in Iran, over the past 40 years, more than 30% of the country's forest cover has been lost due to destruction and excessive exploitation. Based on existing statistics, 40 years ago, there were about 18 million hectares of forests in Iran, but today the country's forest cover has decreased to about 12 million hectares. This statistic was announced in 2009 by Kazem Nasrati, the head of the Forestry Society. Mr. Nasrati named the destruction of forests and wood smuggling, as well as the excessive development of agricultural lands, as the main reasons for the 31% reduction in forest cover in Iran. He had previously warned about the expansion of deserts in Iran, attributing it to excessive irrigation of agricultural lands. Excessive exploitation of the northern forests for wood production and soil erosion has put these forests at risk of gradual destruction. In January of this year, Hadi Kiadliri, the head of the Scientific Forestry Association of the country, warned of the destruction of the Hyrcanian forests within the next one or two decades if these forests are not addressed. Godakram Jalali, the head of the Forests, Rangelands, and Watershed Organization, also recently spoke of a 34% reduction in exploitation of the country's forests compared to 2012. Iran has over 14 million hectares of forest land, of which two million hectares are known as Hyrcanian forests, located in northern Iran along the Caspian Sea. In the same context, a government official stated that only one million hectares of forest land are covered by protective plans. Warnings about the potential destruction of the Hyrcanian forests in the next one or two decades have been issued, along with government approval for the destruction of 100 hectares of Hyrcanian forests for dam construction. The area of northern forests in Iran has 'halved' over the past fifty years, and the risk of destruction of parts of the Gilan forests is exacerbated by the construction of the Shafaroud dam.