Staff Reporter
Peshawar
The erstwhile Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) now the newly merged districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) have seen a decline of 4200 hectares (ha) in the forest cover. This was revealed in a report issued by the Global Forest Watch highlighting the loss of forest cover in the world.
The research claimed that from 2001 to 2018 FATA lost its 4200ha of tree cover equivalent to 4.1 percent decrease in tree cover since 2000 and 9,60,000 tonnes of Carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions (as the trees lost would have absorbed these CO2 emissions released freely in the year). Moreover, the Global Forest Watch data showed 36ha increase in tree cover gained by the FATA from 2001 to 2002 which was equal to 100 percent of all tree cover gained in FATA.‘In 2010, the former FATA had 43,900ha of tree cover, extending over 1.8 percent of its land where as in 2018.
