The Capital Development Authority insists that the chainsaws are saving lives. Over 29,000 paper mulberry trees have been removed since December\u2013felled across Shakarparian, Fatima Jinnah Park, and the Islamabad Expressway\u2013in a bid to curb pollen-induced respiratory illnesses. Each loss, authorities say, will be offset by three fresh saplings. A health campaign, they call it.
\nBut not all the stumps tell that story. WWF-Pakistan\u2019s field investigations show the cutting goes well beyond allergenic trees. In multiple locations, mature canopies have been cleared for roads, monuments, and infrastructure projects. In H-8 alone, five hectares of green cover have vanished. The health rationale, it turns out, conceals another agenda: development.
\nPaper mulberry is a problem. No qualms about that. Invasive, fast-growing, and the dominant source of springtime pollen spikes, it\u2019s not native to this region and has outcompeted indigenous vegetation in Islamabad\u2019s green belts. But as WWF\u2019s forest director notes, sudden, large-scale removal without ecological planning destabilises soil, strips away undergrowth, and disrupts the habitat of urban wildlife. And yet, that\u2019s precisely what appears to be happening; under the banner of public health, but without meaningful oversight.
\nWhat\u2019s missing from the campaign is any trace of process. No publicly released list of species removed. No site-specific ecological assessments. No visible restoration work at key sites. The promised three-for-one compensation planting? Not independently verified. In fact, where infrastructure is advancing fastest, replanting seems more hypothetical than horticultural. The usual tools of environmental governance (impact assessments, disclosure, third-party monitoring) seem to have been bypassed or buried.
\nMeanwhile, green zones are quietly vanishing from the map. Reclassified as brown zones under Islamabad\u2019s Master Plan, previously protected public spaces have been recoded to permit construction. Once excavation begins, revision becomes impossible. The replantation pledges that follow are less a remedy than a ritual. This would be reckless in any city. In Pakistan, it borders on self-sabotage. The country tops the Germanwatch Climate Risk Index for 2025, following the floods that displaced 33 million people and destroyed entire districts. In that context, urban forests are nothing short of fundamental infrastructure; absorbing stormwater, regulating heat, anchoring topsoil, and cleaning air.
\nOfficials insist the removals are lawful, the replantations underway, the intentions noble. But when such plans align so neatly with new monuments and expanded roadways, it becomes harder to accept that line at face value. What\u2019s unfolding in Islamabad is not just deforestation. It\u2019s a slow, quiet redrawing of the urban contract; a shift from shared public greenery to extractive land use, sealed by unexplainable opacity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Capital Development Authority insists that the chainsaws are saving lives. Over 29,000 paper mulberry trees have been removed since December\u2013felled across Shakarparian, Fatima Jinnah Park, and the Islamabad Expressway\u2013in a bid to curb pollen-induced respiratory illnesses. Each loss, authorities say, will be offset by three fresh saplings. A health campaign, they call it. But […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-525616","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-editorial"},"yoast_head":"\n