Saved from the saw, ancient Japanese forests now threatened by tourism
Wed Aug 18, 2:26 AM ET
YAKUSHIMA, Japan (AFP) - A generation ago, a battle was successfully waged on this rugged island to preserve what was left of its primeval forests, home to giant trees millennia old. Now tourism spawned by this natural heritage is threatening its survival.
Tessei Shiba, the local hero who fought government plans to fell the trees three decades ago, is one of those warning of a second crisis posed by the island's biggest earner.
The former town assemblyman launched a campaign in 1972 against the planned commercial exploitation of Yakushima's cedar trees -- many more than 1,000 years old -- after demand for housing timber grew in the late 1960s when Japan's post-World War II recovery took off.
His decade-long campaign ended successfully, saving roughly 1,500 hectares (3,705 acres) of Japan's oldest forest on this volcanic island some 1,100 kilometers (682 miles) southwest of Tokyo.
His efforts won international recognition in 1992 when the island, known as the "Alps in the Ocean" for its central mountain range of peaks exceeding 1,800 meters (5,940 feet), was registered as one of Japan's first UNESCO (news - web sites) nature World Heritage sites.
More than a decade later, Shiba, 61, is determined to start another crusade to conserve the environment which he says has been "visibly damaged" by the recent rapid growth in the number of tourists.
"Yakushima is facing a second and possibly its worst-ever crisis," Shiba said in an interview with AFP.
"I think it's time for me to stand up again in order to ensure this priceless nature can be passed down to our remotest descendants," said the native-born islander.
The number of tourists visiting the island, which has a permanent population of 14,000, rose 8.7 percent to a record 314,766 in the year to March 2004 for the fourth straight annual gain, according to local officials who predict a new record again this year.
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