Wildlife authorities of Lantoto National Park in Yei River County have raised a concern over the illegal destruction of forests in the area.
Lantoto is one of the six national parks in South Sudan. It is located in Tore Payam of Yei River established in 1986 with an area size of 760 square kilometres bordering Garamba National Game Park of the Democratic Republic of Congo.
According to park director Natalino Lasuba, destruction of the forest is endangering the lives of valuable animal species in the park.
He blamed the ministry of agriculture and forestry for failing to regulate lumbering in the area.
“The trees we have here are mostly mahogany, and we took control of these trees because they are inhabitants for these animals. We are supposed to work hand in hand with the ministry of agriculture and forestry, but they have not planted and also not regulating these lumberpersons,” Natalino said. “That is why we see a lot of these trees in the markets and all these trees have been cut from Lantoto Park which is very wrong.”
Meanwhile Malish Stephen a program manager working for a civil society group Organisation for Socio-Economic transformation (OSET) said his organization has documented widespread deforestation without replacement.
“We have been seeing our forest within Yei county and Yei municipality getting depleted because of too much cutting and there is no replacement for that effect,” he said. “This is a very dangerous trend that we are getting in if we have not put in place replacement for the forest that we are cutting then we are seeing a danger in the future.”
Malish urged the government to develop a policy that regulates forest exploitation and environmental protection. A “re-forestation policy” he says would keep the environment green and prevent desertification.