Recently, on January 16, the forest rangers discovered a person carrying wood of unknown origin on a modified tractor.
Expanding the investigation, the forest rangers discovered hundreds of forest trees of species such as Forest phoenixes, Basil, Riding the Red Pine... from group V-VIII that had been cut down. The total volume of 32.623 cubic meters of round wood and 30.634 cubic meters of wood is not qualified.
Initial results determined that the authorities had 528 trees illegally cut down and discovered 10 forest product gathering points. There were 7 subjects involved in the incident who were taken statements and recorded as reporting.
The number of forest trees that were cut down is located in the protective forest area, under the management of the Border Guard Forest Management Board.
The Dak Nong Forest Protection Department determined that this was a complicated deforestation case with signs of crime. This unit has transferred all related records and documents to the Investigation Police Agency of the Provincial Police for handling according to regulations.
Regarding this issue, on March 7, Vice Chairman of Dak Nong Provincial People's Committee Le Trong Yen signed Official Letter No. 12, directing the strengthening of forest management, protection and forest fire prevention and fighting.
Recently, the situation of deforestation in some areas has increased sharply, affecting the forest development plan and increasing the province's general forest coverage.
Therefore, forest management and protection units and People's Committees of districts and cities immediately established inter-sectoral posts in the forest area to patrol, guard, and promptly prevent acts of deforestation.
Forest management and protection units and localities will strengthen strict handling of violations of the Forestry Law; urgently complete land allocation, forest allocation, forest lease, ensure strict forest area management.
Districts and cities mobilize all resources and drastically implement forest protection measures. If the situation of deforestation continues to be complicated, the Provincial People's Committee will strictly handle the responsibility of the head and related organizations.
The Department of Agriculture and Environment directs forest rangers to increase human resources, apply monitoring technology, and ensure strict control of forest areas in the province.
Dak Nong has more than 248,000 hectares of forest, but the situation of deforestation is still complicated.
In December 2024 alone, the whole province detected 36 violations. Of which, there were up to 29 cases of illegal deforestation with an area of 4.96 hectares. Thereby, the total number of violations in 2024 will increase to 322 cases. Forest destruction alone has 203 crops with 45.36 hectares.
Compared to 2023, the total number of violations was more than 39 cases (up 17.3%), the number of deforestation cases was more than 60 cases (up 40.8%), the area of deforested forests was more than 16.96ha (up 57.9%). The authorities have handled 41 cases, confiscated nearly 14m3 of wood, and imposed administrative fines of more than 98 million VND.
According to the assessment, the subjects are increasingly reckless, using sophisticated tricks such as nail traps, electric saws, cutting down trees waiting to fall... making it difficult to protect the forest.
In addition, large forest areas, complex terrain, rapidly increasing free migration and pressure on production land make forest management even more difficult.
Many forest areas have been encroached upon for agricultural crops, but the clearance and enforcement work still faces many obstacles.
