The March sun has finally risen, but with a gloomy landscape in the forest of the western chain of Baalbek-Khermel villages. In recent weeks, excessive tree felling has increased, and property owners and communities do not know the distance from one tree to another, so their hands have reached out to oaks, mallows and wild hawthorn to sell them for heating. Cutting is carried out continuously day and night, even in bad weather. As for the transportation of firewood to customers, it is carried out directly, or by “dungage”, by loading and carrying agricultural tractors, four-wheeled agricultural vehicles and even small thresholds, with a load not exceeding 600 kg of oak or oak wood. .

One of the area residents denied any negative questions about cutting down the oaks, initiating an attack: “No one thinks about us, without ecology, without forest resources. we have been abandoned as citizens, and it encourages us to break the law. ” The man understands that what he is doing is against the law, but the crisis over finding ways to warm up has greatly affected people, especially with the significant increase in diesel prices, which has reached £ 850,000 at most stations. in recent days. And if the price of diesel is calculated based on the £ 750,000 price that has prevailed in recent weeks, the cost is £ 11 million and £ 500,000 per month, a number that is more than possible for the poor and unfortunate. families, and even employees of government agencies, as well as the security and military sectors, after this number exceeded wages and all forms of social assistance, and dropped the official minimum wage. Therefore, they rely on firewood, although green, because they are available initially and their price is more acceptable, since the price of a ton is 3 million pounds, which is enough for about a month and a half, while rely on diesel fuel. involves providing a tank of diesel fuel every two days, and in the cold weather we see double the demand for the house.
The provision of heat for the family was provided by the forests of the western chain, the trees of which were cut down either intentionally and by means of “defense”, or unfairly. A forest official in the area said what is happening in the western range of forests is nothing but “dry shaves of hundreds of dunams,” referring to “unplanned and unfair” logging that begins in forests of Shustara, Bait Al-Salibi and Tariya in Beit-Meshik, Budai, Dar el-Waseah, Deir el-Ahmar, Barqa and Al-Qadam. Up to Hermel hill.
The official says “the cutting is being carried out relentlessly, while the six forest centers of the Ministry of Agriculture in Shustari, Shaat, Deir el-Ahmar, Baalbek, Nabi-Shit and Hermel are helpless, as there are no elements that will allow departments. to prevent violators from all this social and economic turmoil, and the best we can do is fix the violations, even if they are trivial, at a time when we are suffering from a lack of machinery or fuel to run them as you wish. work and no one in the state answers us or supports us, not the secret services, not even our ministry or municipality, ”he said angrily.

The forests of the Ministry of Agriculture do not have the necessary means to suppress violators

Al-Akhbar found that Deir el-Ahmar leshoz had two engines long disabled, and there was no hope for their repair, despite books about them being handed over to the ministry, and no fuel in the mechanisms. of other forests. more than eight months, which is considered a key element in the patrolling organization. To the shame and pursuit of the invaders. The information states that protocols against violators are in the dozens, but these are “not a hindrance due to the inability of the environmental prosecutor’s office in Bekaa, on the one hand, to review protocols that it and speed up their enforcement (they sleep in boxes for about two years), and on the other hand, on the part of the “assessment of fines”, a person with a logging record for cutting and selling fuel in the amount of one hundred million pounds, as well as a record of the seizure in the amount of two million pounds, will not affect it, while the protocols for the seizure of coal will not exceed 25,000 pounds per kilogram, and the amendment to the amount of the fine requires legislation in the House of Representatives, as long as God does His will, ”he said with obvious paradox.