A Brief Account on the Forest Service of the Sudan

By
Dr. Abdelazim Mirghani Ibrahim
Ex – General Manager
Forests National Corporation

• Sudan has been known for more than four thousand years as a country covered by forests. The northern area, which is currently occupied by the desert, was once a dense coniferous forest area evidenced by the petrified coniferous forest of El Kru, currently located near Jebel Barkal in Meroe locality.
• In the Meroitic era, which flourished due to the iron industry, where the humid tropical forests that prevailed in the region at the time were the main source of energy used in this industry. This area witnessed the establishment of a green belt around the city of Alcawa, erected by the great king Tarhaga (690 – 660 BC) to protect it from the encroachment of the desert, perhaps the first official forest activity in the history of Sudan and the first protective tree belt in history.

• The forests of the Sudan were at the forefront of the British concerns when they entered Sudan, a year after they entered the country, they sent in the request of the Indian forestry expert J. A. Murrell to conduct a study on the state of Sudan forests.
• Mr. Murrell, who after circumambulating the country in length and breadth, prepared his report and submitted it on October 1901. In it, he recommended the establishment of a forestry service and the appointment of a director, the reservation and protection of the Blue and White Nile forests for the production of timber, railway sleepers and the supply of firewood to Khartoum city.
• In the following year, 1902, the Department of Forests was established as the first agricultural department in Sudan, with an administrative structure consisting of a British director, two Egyptian deputies, six Sudanese employees and an Italian forest guard, with a budget of five hundred (500) Egyptian pounds without any revenues. The first revenue of the Forest Department was the sale of round wood and firewood in 1905, that amounted to 4699 pounds, of which 111 pounds were spent to repair forests, and the appointment of four inspectors were.
• The first responsibility of the Forest Department when it was established was to provide firewood for Nile ships and to carry out the inventory of forests, i.e. counting their trees, determining their areas and drawing their maps. The first forests that were inventoried were the forests of Disa Abu Hamad (500 acres), Sharaf Ahmed (600 acres), Al-Jurf Bedous (440 acres) and Haroun (760 acres), which were completed by the end of 1905, and then marked with signs bearing the word “government” to prevent encroachment.

• In 1908, Sudan entered the world of sawwood industry, following the revolution of the hero Abdul Qadir Wad Habouba after the colonial government alerted – for security reasons in the first place – to the need to extend the railway line from Khartoum to Sennar in the south and from there to El-Obeid in the west, so forestry works were activated as a result to provide wooden sleepers for railway tracks and fuel for locomotives, so the first two modern saws were introduced to Sudan and operated in each of “Saulil” in the Blue Nile Directorate and “Wau” in the Bahr Al-Ghazal District. The extension of railway lines to the city of El Obeid was followed by the revitalization of gum Arabic trade and exports, and as a result the gum Arabic commodity occupied the first place in the list of exports of the country, and the situation continued in that case until the thirties of the last century to come second after cotton in the list of exports.
• After the establishment of the Sennar dam in 1929, who’s the financial guarantee to ensure it construction has been said was provided by the Gum Arabic.

• On June 15, 1926, the forest of Lakadawia in the White Nile was the first forest to be reserved in Sudan, as a first forest districts with the Ghazita No. 476 in an area of 268 Feddan. This was followed by the reservation of the Nabera forest on the White Nile as well on April 27, 1929 as the second forest to be reserved in Sudan and as the first central forest, by the Ghazita No. 516 in an area of 840 acres.
• In 1932, at the session No. 368 dated January 31, 1932 of the Council of the General Governor of the Sudan, Sir J. L. Mavi, the first forest policy in the Sudan was issued, followed by the issuance of the Central Forest Law 1932 and 1932 Forests Law of the Directorates. This legislation resolved the dispute over forest management authority between the Central Forest Service of the Sudan and the Governments of the Directorates and it strengthened their shared responsibility for forest management. In addition to provision of guidelines for how to establish, manage, protect and exploit centrally reserved forests managed by the Central Forest Department. Locally reserved forests managed by local directorates or councils.
• These legislations have been enforced for more than half a century, with the Forest Policy 1932 being amended to accommodate some of the developments in 1986. The Central Forest Law 1932 and the Directorate Forest Law of 1932 were merged into a single law in 1989 (Forests Act 1989) to accommodate the new concepts contained in the 1986 Forest Policy (the 1932 Amended Policy), and the Fforests National Corporation At 1989 was promulgated for establishment of a national forest authority with legal and independent personality.
• In 2002, the Forests Act 1989 and the Forests National Corporation Act 1989 were merged into a single law to facilitate the application of the law at the court level. In addition to tightening forest protection controls and increasing the penalty for prohibited acts within reserved forests, the establishment of a special police force and the power to revoke forest dereservation to rest with the President of the Republic instead of the competent minister, and gather the fragmented and scattered natural resources institutions between the various executive agencies under the umbrella of a proposed Forests and Natural renewable Resources Corporation in order to achieve harmony in policies, efficiency in management, avoiding conflicts, and weak or absent coordination by the various government agencies