gure translates into the destruction of 7,000 to 9,000 hectares of forested land every year. Today, Pakistan imports about 30 percent of the timber it uses.The heavy deforestation stems from a number of factors. During both the colonial and the post independence periods, entrepreneurs took over and commercially exploited large forest tracts to satisfy the demands of a growing rural and urban population. With the development of canals, hundreds of thousands of hectares of riverine, scrub, and forest land in the Indus plains were cleared for agriculture. Energy demand also has increased pressure on the forests. Wood currently meets approximately one half of national energy requirements. Annual consumption now stands at an estimated 19.70 million cubic meters and is expected to rise to 30.66 million cubic meters by the year 2000. According to the 1980 housing census, approximately 70 percent of all households in Pakistan relied upon wood for cooking and heating, with dependence reaching 80 percent in rural areas. Given continuing high population growth, reports of a further rise in timber demand for cooking and heating are hardly surprising.79The negative consequences of uncontrolled forest exploitation are ever more obvious. They include serious soil erosion and sedimentation, desertification of once-productive upland areas, the silting up of waterways in the plains (making them more prone to flooding), and marked scarcities of fuelwood and building timber (creating an economic burden on low-income communities). The decline in tree cover has already resulted in a large reduction in watershed and reservoir efficiency. Except for a small headpond with daily storage capacity, Pakistan's important Warsak Reservoir - built in 1960 - is now completely silted up. The water's silt burden has caused serious wear on all rotating parts of the reservoir's hydroelectric generating station, and the main powerhouse structure is suffering from alkali-agg...
