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Project Name:
Conservation of Biodiversity of Madhupur Sal Forest through Community Development
Project Description :
Modhupur Sal Forest lies mainly in the district of Tangail central region of Bangladesh between longitude 88° 01¢-92° 41¢ E & 20° 34¢-26° 38¢ N latitude. It comprises the Sal forest on the soil that is catagorized as Modhupur tract. The special feature of the topography of the tract is that forests area located on flat topped hillocks, locally known as Chala, separeted by an intricate network of depressions, called baid. The baids are cultivated for various agricultural crops. Especially paddy while the chalas are inextricably mixed up with homesteads and forest. The topography is undulating. The forest covers an area of 20,784.70 ha. It is tropical moist deciduous forest where Sal (Shorea robusta) is predominant with associate species like Koroi (Albizzia procera), Chambal (Artocarpus chaplasa), Kaikha (Adia cordifolia), Amlaki (Phyllanthus emblica) etc. The project area comprises of 35 villages in the Modhupur forest with a population of 16,000 Gaores (locally called Mandi) plus other Bangalies forest dwellers.
Although Bangladesh is a small country, nature has blessed it with varied wild life biodiversity. Modhupur sal Forest once was rich in biodiversity with different species of birds, mammals and large numbers of reptiles and insects. With the disappearance of the natural forest. Most of the wild animal life in the sal forest has also rapidly vanished. Leopard, Bear, Deer, Cheetah, wild Buffalo And many other animals which were abundant in the sal forest areas have totally disappeared. Flocks of monkeys are rarely seen. Commonly seen near the past, pheasants, Peacocks, Pythons and a variety of birds now hardly seen in the forest. According to survey 1982 Dr. Gytins, UK University reported that Modhupur forest is the home to 21 species of mammals. Cheetah and Swamp Deer are endemic to this area. Traditional sal forest has now become history. After the introduction of commercial monoculture of rubber and eucalyptus and other exotic varieties the shoots and stumps of sal trees have been clean cut in the areas where regeneration could take place with minimum expenses. This has destroyed the chance of protecting biodiversity in the unique sal forest. A scrutiny of forest cover and deforestation provides a dismal picture. Modhupur sal forest in Tangail has shrunk to 1000 hectare in 1990 from 2000 in 1970 (ADB, 1993, Forestry Master Plan).
The ecological rich sal forest ecosystem is being disturbed due to unsustainable resource use practice such as fuel wood cutting, illegal plant felling, overgrazing etc. The total daily fuel wood requrements for the local people are an enormous amount given the scarcity of the resource. People in this area are generally poor, illiterate and support large families, keep large number of livestock, practice subsistence agriculture and their dependence on natural resource for fodder and fuel wood is excessive. wide spread proverty migration of landless people , inappropriate exploitation of forest resource are also known to be causes of depletion of forest. However today the remnants of sal forest do not represent the traditional sal forest as it has been denuded, degraded encroached upon by the peoples or taken for plantation of rubber monoculture and commercial fuel wood. Hence, it is serious threat to the wild life habitat in this area. Due to the pressure the habitat for the endangered species of the forest are declining very fast. There is an urgent need to protect unique features of traditional sal forest as well as to its species.
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