Kashmir To Cut 42000 Trees To Stop COVID 19 – Free PDF Download

The Order

• The Kashmir administration, in a memo dated 2 April 2020, has ordered ‘lopping and felling’ of 42,000 female ‘Russian’ poplar trees planted by the government’s social forestry department.
• Consequently , the local administration in the various districts of Kashmir region of Jammu and Kashmir UT ordered the felling of ‘female’ Russian poplars, within a week.
• If the general public failed to cut down the trees on their property within six days, the district administration would cut them down.
• Trees in state or forest land would have to be felled by the social forestry department or other district level officers.
• The reference to COVID-19 has left medical experts bewildered as there is no evidence from anywhere in the world that pollen can transmit the virus.

What is this ‘Russian’ Tree?

• Populus deltoides
• North American Cotton Tree
• It is known to grow faster than other original varieties of poplar in the valley, so is popular with the local growers.

‘Russi’ Poplar

• These poplar trees were introduced in Kashmir in 1982 from the US under a World Bank-aided social forestry scheme to boost the local economy, meet the need for wood and aid in afforestation.
• The tree has become a part of Kashmir’s landscape since then.
• About 15 million of these North American cotton trees currently in Kashmir.

The 2015 J&K High court order

• In a 2015 order, the Jammu and Kashmir high court had noted,
• “It is a common knowledge that pollen seed of poplars is adversely affecting health of general public, mostly of elderly people and children. The pollen seed of these trees has given rise to chest diseases in Kashmir, which can become life threatening for them”.
• The administration was advised to fell these trees.

The Allergy season

• The J&K Govt has already felled 26,000 such trees in the past and wants to finish chopping off branches or cutting down whole trees before the flowering season in April and May.
• It is in this season that the trees start releasing their fluffy seeds enveloped in a cotton-like blanket, confused as pollen.

What does Science say?

• A 2017 study by the Government Medical College, Srinagar found that the pollen of “Russian poplars” can cause allergic reactions in less than 20% of the population.
• Compared to this, pollen from common grass is likely to cause allergic reactions in 73.5%
• A common cause for the spike in allergies is pollen shed by various plants
• The shedding of fluffy cotton-covered seeds by poplar trees is highly unlikely to cause Allergies or spread COVID19 .

Male vs Female

• The J&K government has specifically targeted female poplars, reportedly for pollen shedding.
• But Female trees do not shed pollen, it is the male of the species that does so.
• Female plants do produce seeds after fertilisation, which then need to be dispersed.
• The pollen (in reality, unfertilised seed) of Russian poplar trees is not a health hazard and causes far less allergies than even house dust and pine cones; simple pruning the canopy would reduce the pollen.

Benefits of Poplar tree

• They have many benefits –

1. revenue generation – source of construction wood
2. uses in fruit industry,
3. phyto remediation,
4. ecological waste water treatment systems,
5. stream bank stabilisation,
6. soil erosion control

• The local apple box manufacturing units, mostly in Anantnag and Kulgam districts are heavily dependent on these trees.
• The proposed mass tree felling will lead to an excess of supply and will lower prices for the final product in the coming harvesting season.
• Next season – acute shortage

What happens if trees are felled indiscriminately?

1. Green cover in Kashmir goes for a toss.
2. Devastating effect on the environment.
3. River bank erosion

• Felling Thousands of trees en masse will be a disaster both for the ecology and the economy of Kashmir.

Order stayed

• On 11 April , the Jammu and Kashmir High Court stayed its own 2015 order directing the civil administration to cut down Poplar trees.
• The court asked the J&K administration to constitute a committee of experts within four days, to ascertain the desirability of cutting down Russian poplars .

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