VIA Dawn.com | CHITRAL, June 12: Exploitation of vast resources of non-timber forest (NTF) products in Chitral can help fight poverty and raise the living standard of people.
This was stated by deputy director of non-timber forest products of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa forest department Iftikhar Ahmed while addressing local field workers during his visit here on Friday.
He said efforts were in progress to exploit the resources on sustainable basis and for this purpose a complex was being set up in the district for which land had been acquired.
Mr Ahmed said the active participation of the local communities must be enlisted and a comprehensive training on natural resource management must be imparted to them.
He said that the villagers would be able to earn livelihood by using the natural item which otherwise went waste. He described the medicinal plants in the pastures and forests, honey-bee keeping and sericulture as the potential sources.
He said that forest conservation was possible only when the locals derived full advantage of the non-timber products.
Later on, he visited a number of projects initiated by the department which included conservation of medicinal plants in Momy, zafron demonstration plots in Iingjirate Drosh, honey-bee keeping activities in Kalash valley.
Mr Ahmed was accompanied by assistant director Mohammad Tayyib Marwat and district in-charge of NTF Ijaz Ahmed.
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