Ecobreves – COLOMBIA: Reforesting 3,000 Hectares

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BOGOTA, Aug 2 2004 (IPS) - The Colombian Fund for Agricultural Financing, FINAGRO, will cover the costs this year for planting lumber species of trees over 3,000 hectares in the northern departments of Cesar and Magdalena. The program, to cost some 22.3 million dollars, will benefit the peasant farmers in the region, planting 'tecas' (Tectona grandis), 'melinas' (Gmelina arborea) and 'ceibas' (Ceiba pentandra), FINAGRO expert Fabián Grisales told Tierramérica.

Colombia loses around 101,000 hectares of forest each year, mostly due to the advance of the farming frontier and the expansion of commercial logging, announced the Colombian Institute of Hydrology, Meteorology and Environmental Studies, in July.

In the Colombian Amazon, along the Pacific coast and a part of the country's Andean region, the forested area dropped from 56.28 million hectares in 1994 to 55.61 million hectares in 2001, said the study.