Kindia | Seydouba Sylla: “the Kindia water and forest section works to preserve the ecosystem…”

This year, nature conservationists reforested 100 hectares. In the city of citrus fruits, nature workers are redoubling their efforts to make people understand the origin of bush fires and, above all, how to combat deforestation. To understand the activities carried out and the strategies put in place to protect the local environment, the unit commander of nature conservationists Seydouba Sylla, prefectural section head of water and forests of Kindia, responds to Universciences.

Universciences: What are you doing to protect the environment in Kindia?

Seydouba Sylla:Our sovereign mission is to protect forests, our eco-system in general. In Kindia we have 12 forests classified by the State and 16 community forests, and as such the conservationists have left to monitor these forests so that they do not degrade further. Apart from protection, we carry out the restoration of denuded or degraded areas through the reforestation actions that we carry out each year, supporting not only the communities but also through our own actions in these classified forests.

Universciences: This year you carried out reforestation?

SS: We have reforested rather in area, we, the water and forests section including our cantonments in the sub-prefectures, we have reforested 15 hectares. But the prefecture of Kindia, the reforestation statistics that reached us, there are more than 100 hectares that are reforested, because as you know, Kindia is home to several hydroelectric dams, so the banks and spring heads of these dams were targeted this year. In particular the Konkouré river which shelters the Kaléta, Garafiri and Souapiti dams. This river was targeted by the Ministry of Water and Forests. The banks of Bangouya and the heads of the same river have been reforested to more than 10 hectares.

Universciences: there are many people who engage in slash-and-burn cultivation, what are these consequences?

SS:This is large-scale deforestation. Farmers work the land in a rudimentary way so they need the means to improve their living conditions, by developing the land, providing fertilizer or learning composting to produce on a small scale but give a high yield.

University of Science: what are you doing to limit these practices which have enormous consequences on the environment?

SS: The first strategy that we apply is first awareness, through the media, then local awareness sessions through our agents who are seconded to supervise, inform and raise awareness in especially rural communities. Regarding slash and burn cultivation, it is an ancestral practice which is very difficult to remedy because at the moment there is no alternative solution. Slash-and-burn cultivation is a form of large-scale deforestation. If we told people to stop slash-and-burn cultivation, the lowlands were developed, I think that would create another problem in relation to the livelihood of the populations, which is why this problem persists today. We advise them, for example if they have to cultivate or clear the edges of watercourses or spring heads, to leave margins of approximately 100 to 200 meters, protective strips between the banks of a watercourse and the spring heads.

Universciences: these are the measures you considered to remedy this, are they respected?

SS: of course, the effect in Kindia is positive. We have the statistics on bushfires. This year Kindia recorded fewer bush fires, because our agents are there when people want to burn their fields, they assist them, they say to put the strips of fire varying from 5 to 10 meters between the cut strip and the forest of the rest of the bush so as not to let the fire overflow, to be assisted by several young people or villagers and not to isolate otherwise the fire will overflow and the person concerned will not be able to control. There are many measures being taken in this direction.

Universciences: what are the techniques or strategies that you use to help citizens understand the dangers of slash-and-burn cultivation?

SS:In Kindia today, the population, through our theoretical and practical awareness measures, the cultivators or farmers have understood, if they let the fire burn the rest of the bush, that means the following year, they will no longer be able to work. The fallow land is spoiled, which is why nature conservationists are deployed, they assist them. That is to say when you cut, you want to overflow, they come and stop you. They also inform you when the time comes before setting fire on the part that you have cleared, you must inform them so that they themselves come and assist in teaching the population the technique of setting fires, according to the direction of the wind so that it is not difficult to control.

Comments collected by our special correspondent in Kindia, Maimouna Bangoura