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pethiyagoda Sri Lanka’s forest cover is estimated to be about 27% of the land area. It was three times this extent a few decades back. The Forest Department was one of the first to be established by the British and is a hundred years old. The dwindling forest cover is a constant lament among Environmentalists, Ecologists, Foresters and Wildlife enthusiasts. Forests and trees have recognised economic and aesthetic value. Bhutan is a good example, maintaining some 70-80% of the land area in natural forest, with a corresponding benefit to the “quality of life”. Generally, trees are desirable and have many virtues that are the subject of this note. It is only exceptionally, such as when their roots invade building foundation or when they fall on roofs, that they cause damaging negative effects.

Sri Lanka is subject to droughts and floods that are increasing in frequency and severity and likely to do so in the future as well. There is a real fear that these multiple effects of global warming could have serious effects that may in the distant future lead to the extinction of life on the Planet. Scientists have evidence to believe that this has happened in the past – as dramatised by the sudden disappearance of the Dinosaurs. The terror of extinction is so much ahead however that our generation may feel no need to worry.

But there are more immediate considerations. The fears are real that the World may run out of fuel, water and clean air. For all these perils, forests and trees, directly or indirectly, are important influences. Mercifully, Sri Lanka is outside the worst Hurricane, Earthquake and Volcanic Zones. But as a small island set in the Tropical Monsoon Zone, we are vulnerable to localized perils and must remember the devastating tsunami of not so long ago. Further, there is a global moral obligation. It is easy to see that global warming will impose pressures on fossil fuels, water and clean air. These long-term consequences cannot be ignored – small though our overall impact might be. A few random considerations are touched.

Pressures of agriculture and urbanisation have caused heavy losses of forest cover. The Mahaweli scheme is a recent case in point. For convenience in awarding contracts and for other reasons, clearing operations have been allocated in extents much in excess of immediate needs. It would have been ecological prudent for clearing operations to keep pace with settlement demands. Also it may well be realised in the future that the most stable system for dry zone farming, would be for areas farmed to alternate with reserves of native forests alternating with farmed land – in a “patchwork” or “strip – planting” style, with dimensions and cycles appropriately determined. Such arrangement would also create fire-gaps should there be devastating fire accidents and provide shelter for Wildlife as well.

 Present forestry practices treat forested areas as isolated from human trespass. Much evidence proves that this is a failure. Timber thieves and other despoilers (eg. treasure hunters, gem prospectors, squatters, poachers and vandals) are not deterred. Much the better approach should be to enlist the co-operation of locals as joint users. This will guard against marauders and allow regulated access to timber and other forest products (firewood, fruits and medicinal herbs). Regulated harvesting of so-called “Bush Meat”, which is anyway poached, would be possible. A sense of ownership of forest resources has many benefits. Other countries have used such approaches successfully.

 Clearing of tree cover has spectacular damaging effects on water flow of small streams – they easily disappear. Exposed soils dry out quicker, the water table drops and wells become less productive. The ameliorative effects of trees on coolness become immediately apparent to anyone venturing into forest or tree reserves. Forest tree roots open up the soil, encouraging readier infiltration of rain water. Additionally leaf fall increases water retention and slow release in the mulch. Tradition recognises that some trees such as Kumbuk are specially valuable alongside wells. Tree roots also purify water as it moves through and may even have use in respect of CKDU by detoxification. One wonders whether this factor has been considered by the many studies that have been do9ne in the search for possible causes. Trees are also invaluable in controlling soil erosion or in draining swamps – often so employed in “Woodlots” on tea estates.

 A whole new discipline termed “Agroforestry” has developed. This consists of reforesting with trees of immediate use. We have many such that could serve – the selections naturally depending on particular circumstances. Tropical Farming has a historical reliance on tree crops – often based on livelihood and market needs. The socalled “Kandyan Forest Garden” is often cited as an excellent example. The Chena system coped with depletion of soil fertility by simply moving on to fresh forests which were abundant in the past.It may be noted that in Chena Farming, the operation is referred to as “Eli peheli kireema”, meaning in essence that the trees are thinned, no removed entirely. Bhutan as mentioned, is estimated to retain 70 to 80% of their land in forest, with corresponding benefits to quality of life. Not without significance is that Bhutan replaces Gross National Product (GNP) with Gross National Happiness (GNH). Appropriate candidates for agroforestry are very many. In addition to fuel and pulp needs, forests are in use in other Tropical regions carrying a variety of timber species, Bamboos with dozens of species grown for special uses, fruits such as Jak, Breadfruit, Durian, Woodapple, Beli, Mora, Goraka etc and industrial crops such as Kapok, Kekuna, Castor (and other Energy Crops to reduce the need for petroleum products). Opportunities are infinite, each for its environmental niche.

 F.H (Sam) Popham was an adventurous retired tea planter who took it upon himself to develop a means of resuscitating degraded forest land in the Dry Zone. He acquired some 18 acres of degraded scrub alongside the Dambulla –Kandalama Road. He spent his entire pension and contributions from benefactor friends in the UK, to experiment on a novel concept. He observed a few vital rules, essentially based on the notion that Nature, if helped to do its job, was a far better forester than man. The usual foes were weeds, fire, stray cattle and humans. The major effort was to meticulously remove all thorny choking weeds and coarse grass. Fire gaps were established. Cattle were fenced out but wild life was afforded entry. Only privileged human visitors were permitted. He kept a careful and detailed diary of daily rainfall and water table (in his well) records. Not a single plant was introduced. Only forest tree seedlings, naturally dispersed were preserved.

The results were astonishing. The scrub progressively disappeared over the years to be replaced by a mix of indigenous trees that took on the appearance of a Temperate meadow. Dried stream beds awoke to life and fish, crabs and frogs appeared. Small wild life and Jungle fowl visited every afternoon to a corner, which became a “Feeding Station”. Popham left a few years ago, bequeathing his treasure to the IFS who in turn passed it on to “Ruk Rekaganno” who it is hoped, still honour the “Popham Principles”. Although expensive a method to adopt widely, this was a classic achievement.

Incidentally, Popham was a Cambridge Alumnus (Classics) and one is tempted to believe that this helped. Much the same principle has been adopted by (Rohan) Pethiyagoda, who on some 50 acres of degraded Tea was developed into a Wet Montane Forest, by merely allowing abandoned tea to grow into medium-sized tree s and secondary forest established.

The World is moving away from fossil fuels and moving to renewable energy forms – mainly solar, wind and biomass. In our context the last is most relevant, as the cheapest option and as rural dependence on wood fuel is very large. A good proportion of this is gathered from forests. An organized effort to grow high wood producing trees (Gliricidia initially) intends to make an impact on its use for industrial needs and for dendro-power generation. Interesting projections for the extents of fuel-wood plantations required for generation of electricity from decentralised power stations sited close to consumption centres have suggested attractive operations. Wood requirements of such small power units, tailored to specific regional needs have been calculated. This would be a true and non-controversial “devolution of power”! The late Dr Ray Wijewardene has to be honoured as an enterprising pioneer, who established Gliricidia as an intercrop on his coconut property, designed and built his own generator, of a size sufficient for his bungalow needs and to recharge his electric car and still provide basic power needs for his rural neighbours.

Excellent PR ! Strangely, little systematic attempts have been made to support and encourage domestic solar power installations. Even heavily industrialised, Western countries are busily expanding this option. For us, this would remove a considerable drain from grid supplies, releasing the saved power for other uses. The same holds for wind power. There has also been some mention of Norwegian-assisted wave-energy projects. Meanwhile, for an inscrutable reason, two large coal power stations are reportedly imminent, at a time when the rest of the World is moving away from coal for power!

Extensive mangroves grow in areas around lagoons and river mouths where the sea meets fresh water. The brackish and sheltered environments provide valuable breeding grounds for shellfish, crabs and some true fish. They are under stress due to unregulated harvesting as firewood. They protect shore-lines from erosion, and when the Tsunami struck, as a protective barrier. To address the dwindling area of this precious resource, a project to replenish the exploited mangroves, a commendable project supported by a large company (and the Sri Lankan Navy) is in progress. The ideal component trees are fortunately quick to establish.

 Mangroves are vital in improving several environmental factors. Travellers through the Hambantota area may have noticed that in recent years, a medium-sized tree, known locally as Katu Andara has colonised the sand dunes and surrounding areas, spreading rapidly. This tree (Prosopis juliflora), known also as Mesquite and Tamaruga is considered an invasive species and believed to have been introduced in the 1950’s as a cover for the sand dunes in this arid area. This it has done well, but proved to be highly invasive and has spread well beyond its original area. It has limited uses – of the pods and seeds as a minor food, for medicinal uses and the young foliage as fodder for roaming cattle. Its bark may well be of use for tanning leather. Its sudden spread is probably due to cattle feeding on it and passing the seeds out with their dung. Although useful as firewood, its thorny nature is a disadvantage.

It burns fiercely and thus could find use for dendro-power. Due to its thorny nature, it would require mechanized harvesting (tractors) to meet handling problems. Its rapid growth is an advantage. It could even prove to be a pioneer species to enable planting these otherwise barren wastes with useful tree crops (like Cashew) once “softened” by this tree. One remembers how the barren wastes of the Dry Patanas, widely regarded as inhospitable for use, were transformed by planting with Gums (Eucalyptus). This in turn elevated Palugama to the township of Keppetipola. This was more than a mere change of name !. One is aware that widespread monoculture plantings (in our case, Pinus) are controversial for ecological reasons. The original intent ion to use these plantation as a source of pulp for paper, is yet to become a reality.

PRESERVING ENDEMICS AND THE GENEPOOL

Our country is highly blessed with a wealth of endemic and sometimes unique, plants and animals. It is classified as a “Biodiversity Hotspot” by UNESCO. This floral and faunal variability has to be preserved, not least because it could be a massive asset, for breeding, search for novel products such as herbal pharmaceuticals and as a tourist attraction. Bio-piracy is of huge international concern. Much of our endemic flora grows in the Low Country Wet Zone, in which the Sinharaja represents the only sizeable remnant. Encroachments by tea plantings, and poorly located mini-hydropower plants, need to be controlled. The recent frequency of detections by Customs of attempts to smuggle out Wallapatta (Agar Wood) suggests widespread despoiling of protected reserves – possibly before the very eyes of policing authorities. As is well known, a large percentage of Medicines are of plant origin, and much probably are still in the forests awaiting discovery.

There exist considerable extents of abandoned or uneconomic tea lands. These should be earmarked for other uses. The soils have been so impoverished that few substitute species will thrive. One immediate approach may be to allow such tea bushes as have survived in such areas to remain and grow into trees, to be a nucleus allowing forest trees to establish. Once some fertility is thereby regained, more profitable cultivations could succeed. Illegal cultivations above the legally prescribed contours should be compulsorily and forthwith abandoned for reversal into Montane Forest. The Central Highlands need protection as the principal source which nourish our rivers.

The World’s recognition of increased atmospheric carbon dioxide as an important cause of Global Warming, has established a scheme of “Carbon Credits”. This is calculated based on actions taken to reduce carbon dioxide emissions to the atmosphere. A globally accepted scheme exists for awarding “Carbon Credits” that could be traded with countries which were requiring over agreed quotas. Thrifty countries are awarded credits for carbon sequestration which they could sell or barter with excess emitters. The “currencies” were valued at one Unit per ton of carbon dioxide. Recognising that developed countries were the larger emitters (through industry, vehicles, and domestic consumption etc) they were obliged to make greater reductions (at 25% of figures, with 1990 as the base year, with developing countries assigned lower percentages and other concessions to meet their targets). The scheme operates similar to the Stock Market.

Each country farms out its allocation, to its high emission companies. Any company operating within its allocation could trade its savings on the stock market, for trading with those releasing above quota. The latter are required to pay a tax or purchase the deficit from the market. While it is relatively easy to calculate emissions, from industry and power installations, the interplay of many variables makes the task more difficult for sequestration by forest trees. As a result, while emission figures were set out relatively easily for industrial emissions, those for trapping in forest trees have led to many difficulties of implementation because of the complexity of several variables. Amidst all the complications, an important consideration is that trapped carbon in trees is offset by releases through decay or burning of fallen leaves and branches and eventually as timber. The locking up of carbon is thus temporary. These various issues merit the closest attention by our competent professionals

Aragalaya backfired? Where are we heading?

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Two popular sayings come to mind – the old Sinhala one – “miti thenen thamai watura yanne (water flows from the lowest end). The other – ” Going with blinkers). Both are very aptly applicable to the goernment’s decision to permit three-wheelers to obtain fuel only from their local registered shed. Considering the possibility, or probability, of any three-wheeler running short of fuel in a long distance run, or even otherwise, way out of his registration point, both the vehicle and the passenger will be completely stranded and be victims of another kind of “chandiya” or hawk. Given the need to introduce systems and methods in this crisis situation, the powers-that-be need to act with circumspect, reasonableness and responsibility without leaving room for people to mock at irresponsible governance, inhumanity and blinkered vision, bringing the administration into more disrepute. The QR system has its merits but not if introduced in the copy-book style, catering more to the blocks with power than to the voiceless majority. It needs to be tailored to suit local conditions.

If not for the Aragalaya, the world would only have seen the Sri Lanka, which had been reduced to charity from a generous beggar in Tamil Nadu, who had obviously managed his personal finances better than the Sri Lankan state had managed ours. Sri Lanka had become a pathetic place.

Our dignity was restored not by the unelected Ranil Wickremesinghe but by the Aragalaya. The world witnessed a renaissance of Sri Lankan society of the public space, thanks to the civic resistance movement, drawn from all age groups, and finally, starting April 3rd, 2022 on Galle Face green by the Aragalaya. The world saw on July 9th, the people of Sri Lanka, led by the youth, liberating the President’s House and then swarming up like a tsunami wave up the steps and through the doors of the Presidential Secretariat.The Sri Lankan story was turned into a dramatic triumph of social self-assertion by the people of the island.

Does – will – the Aragalaya story, the story of the most massive and successful popular uprising in our history, the most successful assertion of democratic-republican popular sovereignty since Independence, end with the Constitutional coup, the Constitutional equivalent of the Central Bank bond scam, and the installation in the seat of power by the reviled Rajapaksa ruling clan, of Ranil Wickremesinghe, the most unpopular and hitherto unsuccessful political leader of our lifetime?

It will cause terrible psychological damage to our collective psyche, if we permit the story to end in that manner. It would be as if we had lost the war to the Tigers. We didn’t. We write this story and it needs to be completed satisfactorily, with the people as the rebellious, victorious heroes.

Gotabaya Rajapaksa’s rule became untenable when the day he decided on an overnight ban on chemical fertiliser, pesticide and weedicide. It was not only the economic consequences that caused the slide. It was the moral crime involved. He had won on a manifesto that pledged to make things much better and as part of that, to undertake a decade-long transition to organic agriculture. Instead, he devastated the peasantry that had voted for him, in 2019, and his family, for seven decades. It was a moral upending. When Gotabaya lost the moral high-ground, it was inevitable he would lose his grip on power.

Wickremesinghe has made a similar blunder, committed a moral crime, under less affordable circumstances. He has turned on, and cracked down on, the very Aragalaya that unintentionally, but quite definitely, brought him to power by removing Gotabaya Rajapaksa in a massive collective heave-ho.

Of course, this is but a large-scale version of how he double-crossed Sirisena Cooray, former UNP General-Secretary, who gave him the Prime Ministership he was himself offered in 1993. I know. I was there when it happened, in 1997. He also double-crossed Karu Jayasuriya from the very moment he handsomely won the Colombo mayoralty. I was there then, too, and warned Karu J that it would happen. Treachery is the trademark political ‘step-style’– as Gail Sheehy puts in, in ‘Passages’—of Mr. Wickremesinghe.

This time, the political and historical price will be far higher. Mr. Wickremesinghe has betrayed a mass democratic revolution, the Aragalaya, in full view of the world’s media. And he has only just got started.

Already his Cabinet Ministers are talking about “terrorism” and “terrorists” lurking in or hiding behind the Aragalaya. This is not just stuff and nonsense; it is very dangerous stuff. “Terrorism” is the organized and intentional use of lethal violence for political purpose, against unarmed, non-combatant civilians.Not every armed struggle is terrorism or contains terrorism, though in Sri Lanka it notoriously did—and in any case there was no armed activity in the Aragalaya or in support of it.

Homicide or manslaughter by a mob, as on the afternoon/night of May 9th, though a heinous crime, which must be punished by the full force of the normal law, is not terrorism.There was and is no “terrorism” within, alongside or behind the Aragalaya.

RANIL AND THE RANCID RIGHT

President Wickremesinghe has inherited the burdens of the Rajapaksa-created economic crisis, and cannot be sympathized with for his predicament because he was chosen by the soon-to-be deposed autocrat Gotabaya Rajapaksa as PM and more conspicuously, was voted in by the Rajapaksa-dominated ruling SLPP parliamentarians, as the President.

The economic recovery is deadlocked not only by the obvious problems of the chicken-and-the egg, IMF and the creditors conundrum. It is deadlocked even tighter now, by President Ranil’s choices and actions. He should have stepped down and made way for a political leader with some mass base, who could have made a fresh start and had a better shot at managing the crisis. Since Sajith Premadasa bravely ran against Gotabaya Rajapaksa, in November 2019, and lost by only 10%, missing the magic 50% mark by only 8%, he would have been the logical first option.

Instead, Mr. Wickremesinghe discredited himself by being the Rajapaksa’s man in the race, thereby reinforcing the impression of continuity rather than discontinuity with the ancien regime, the Old Guard. He, therefore, causes the forfeiture of the global wave of support we could have obtained and can still obtain as the country where the young people rose up and threw out an autocrat.

Ranil does more damage than even this, by cracking down on the Aragalaya activists and being seen as the repressive unpopular ruler he is. Why should world opinion bail out a country with that kind of narrative; that kind of story? Where’s the catharsis? Where’s the bounce? Where’s the happy ending?

For this story to end with a real catharsis, the unfinished Aragalaya must be taken to a logical conclusion, with a generational shift from the 70-something Establishment. The Aragalaya was not meant to and cannot be allowed to end with the installation of an unelected leader who becomes, or reveals himself, as an autocrat overnight.

Ranil is trying to kill the Aragalaya by repression, suffocation. He must not be allowed to. That is not how this great story must end; must go into the continuous chronicle of this island’s history.

That is why “RANIL RESIGN!” must resonate and resound in the final phase of the great national liberation struggle for freedom and democracy in our lifetimes: the Aragalaya!

We, in Sri Lanka, need to take stock of where we are. We need to seek and find business opportunities and find matching resources that are currently available, in order to get to where we want to go; to achieve our economic and political objectives. Sri Lankans must pull themselves out of this calamity quickly.

We must develop a clear vision of the modern society we want to be, and what Sri Lankans must do to get there. We need to identify the resources and means to implement a new long-term plan to recovery and reach a good standard of development. The stinking holes that pass for public toilets have to go, for example.

What are our priorities? We must encourage and develop income generating projects, but also pass laws that strengthen all the necessary legal and financial controls which will help stop pilfering and corruption. All areas of business activity must contribute to fund raising for this development activity. It must be a group effort to raise Sri Lankan finances to enable further development according to what is considered priority and expected profitability.

We need to develop “niche” activities which add to our commercial and industrial base, and which, coincidently, provide skills-based jobs. For example, Sri Lanka was a producer of barbed wire. There may be opportunities for liaison with Indian industry to finish products, assemble machines or add value to a product.

All imports need to be examined to evaluate the possibility of manufacture here, to save import expenditure and create jobs. We see lines of Sri Lankans seeking work abroad. But many interesting employment opportunities can and should be created here. Sri Lanka needs a broad manufacturing and industrial base as a form of economic strength.

Sri Lanka needs to broaden its fields of expertise. We need workshops where skilled toolmakers and pattern makers create high value work. We need metallurgical laboratories to identify metals and their structure. Britain was investing in dockyards located near Ukrainian steelworks; there is a shortage of ship building and repair yards world wide – why not build them here? If so, we need certified welders and people with weld certification competence.

Building and construction projects are riddled with opportunities for siphoning off materials and money. Look at the contract signing procedures for constructing the expressways for example. Therefore, independent quantity surveyors and contracts engineers need to be trained and employed by project owners to monitor and ensure contract fulfillment before final signoff and payments are made. You can see many roads are partially constructed but remain unfinished, all around the country, due to contract management failure. This is an inefficiency drag on the whole country. It is certainly due to legal failure in the area of contract agreements and legally, contractually agreed obligations. After the formalizing of a contract, professionals are needed to administer the contract. But there may be a lack of incorruptible contract engineers or managers and quantity surveyors who are willing to invoke the law on contractual matters to get fair judgments and fair and correct legal assessments of the respective party’s obligations and responsibilities.

It is the sovereignty and will of the people to unite and help achieve the goals of creating a modern bright, clean, colourful, well laid out and pleasant environment for a modernized society. These already exist in some countries and can be used as models.

To achieve this or any portion of this, the whole working population needs to understand and be willing to add their support to these projects: to commit to these development goals. Management needs to be supportive and proactive in this endeavor otherwise, it can all fall back into the same old bad habits. It has to be a combination of selling the concepts of development to the workforce, and bullying to get things done and finished: democracy at work but submitting to the tyranny of finance and the marketplace – customer satisfaction.

Looking around the world, we see great strides achieved by others; wonderful examples of well designed, well thought out housing, leisure and entertainment living spaces along with a big effort to not impinge on nature with urban sprawl. Why not go out and see what is good around the world and copy it instead of repeating the same mistakes others have made before us? Places of employment needs to be close to living spaces but not actually in them. We need that separation. We need intelligent urban planning to create pleasant living spaces for ourselves and our children. Please see this effort as an opportunity, and at this late stage we ought to benefit from the best design ideas of others.

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