KAMPALA - While Uganda suffers violent protests over plans to turn a big chunk of its rainforest into sugarcane, Ugandans are destroying eight times as much forest every year due to poverty, a minister said on Wednesday.

Minister of State for Environment Jesca Eriyo told Reuters rural poverty and population pressure on increasingly scarce land and resources was devastating the east African country's forest cover. "About 55,000 hectares (136,000 acres) of forest cover per annum disappears," she said. "That is a big challenge to us."

Last week, a protest against government plans to give at least 7,100 hectares (17,000 acres) or nearly a third of Mabira Forest Reserve to the Indian-owned Mehta Group's sugar estate turned violent. Three people were killed, including an Indian man who was stoned to death by rioters.

Two opposition politicians and a local environmentalist were charged on Tuesday with participating in the riot, triggering further unrest as police cracked down on their supporters in the streets of Kampala.

Mabira has been a nature reserve since 1932 and the idea of razing part of it, proposed by President Yoweri Museveni last year, is deeply unpopular. Even some of Museveni's closest aides have openly questioned the plan. Critics say it would have grave ecological consequences, from increased soil erosion and silting to the drying up of rivers and rainfall, and the removal of a buffer against polluting nearby Lake Victoria.

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It would also threaten rare monkeys and nine species found only in Mabira and surrounding forests -- the Tit Hylia bird, six butterflies, a moth and a shrub used to treat malaria. Museveni says saving wildlife is a luxury for rich nations.

But Eriyo said losing this piece of Mabira would still only be a fraction of the deforestation caused annually by poor Ugandans, mostly in rural areas. "They are clearing for agricultural purposes, for firewood and timber. Charcoal burning is really bad...Let's talk about (this), not just the 7,100 hectares (of Mabira)," she said.

Though much of Uganda's forest is planted, not natural, Eriyo said it was not being replanted to keep pace with deforestation. The government was trying to teach rural communities the value of conserving forest, she said.

A UN report last month put Uganda as one of the world's fastest growing populations, expecting it to triple in the next 40 years. "If you don't create jobs for them (the growing population), they will encroach on ... forests," Eriyo said.

But Mabira, 50 km (30 miles) east of Kampala, is regarded by Ugandans as a national treasure and a place where ancestral spirits of the main Baganda ethnic group dwell. Eriyo said ministers would weigh environmental factors and the public outcry, stressing that no decision had been taken. "Government has not yet discussed the issue. The process is very elaborate ... It has to go through parliament," she said.

(By Tim Cocks, Planet Ark, 19/04/2007)