Bangladesh’s greenery is an inextricable part of its national identity, and given the dire state of our capital city’s environmental integrity it is clear that our urban spaces need more trees than ever.
Which is why our city administrations’ recent war against trees has been utterly baffling at best and dangerous at worst — with a city as populous and as congested with vehicles as Dhaka, trees play a vital role in the city’s infrastructural make-up and its sustainability. And while there are laws in place which call for explicit permission being granted by the administration to fell trees in public spaces, such rules are seemingly always flouted, but that is entirely besides the point when the administration itself is often at the root of such environmentally-harmful actions.
One need only think back to earlier this year when Dhaka South City Corporation decided to fell several hundred trees in the capital’s Dhanmondi area for the sake of “beautification” despite repeated warnings from experts, to realize that such laws mean little to nothing. Which is why we take the DNCC mayor’s recent pledge that no trees would be cut down without permission under his jurisdiction with a grain of salt.
The mayor’s stance that environmental conservation comes above all is incontrovertible, but such conservation efforts cannot simply apply to one half of the capital city — our city corporations need to show more unity in this regard.
Our urban hubs stand to gain the most from trees as they can be immensely beneficial in reducing temperatures and helping to prevent calamities such as flooding. While planting saplings for the future is a noble initiative, it does nothing to mitigate the effects which are bound to hit us from felling trees today.
Development and beautification do not have to come at the cost of the environment, if anything there is an argument to be made that neither is achievable without an appropriate amount of greenery in our cities.
We need our cities to be livable above all else.