Sandalwood Rackets: Why They Were Not Caught?

Neth FM, one of the popular radio channels in Sri Lanka had a program on 17th April 2012 regarding illegal sandalwood trade. The most highlighted issue in the program was the illegal felling of sandalwood trees from Buddhist Temples in many areas of the country. Those trees in the temples were kept due to the religious and cultural values and not due to the monetary values. Therefore Buddhist Priests let those trees to grow for a long time and the size of such trees could be the most attractive feature for those ruthless people. The other reason could be the very low security in the temple premises.

The producers of the program repeatedly questioned the inability of the Sri Lanka police to catch the crimes at least when the heavy logs of sandalwood are transported to different locations from the illegally harvested areas. They suspected that the very powerful people may be behind this illegal sandalwood trade and that could be the reason for not having the crimes caught.

During the program villagers from many areas of the island made telephone calls complaining about thefts of their trees. The population of naturally grown sandalwood in Sri Lanka is declining at an alarming rate and therefore actions should be taken immediately to sop these rackets before it becomes too late.

Indian Sandalwood in Sri Lanka: Current Issues

Indian sandalwood scientifically known as Santalum album of the family Santalaceae grows well in the hilly areas of the intermediate zone of Sri Lanka. 

Indian sandalwood may be the mostly mentioned tree species in the ancient literature found in India and Sri Lanka. In Subhashitha (Sinhala advisory poems), written by Algiyawenna Mukaveti before about 500 years, it is said that, "Good people with high qualities do not get hurt even due to very harsh actions by others. In fact their qualities spread as sandalwood spreads its fragrance wider and wider as it is cut and beaten".

In Guttilia Kavya (written by Ven. Vetteve Thero in Kotte Kingdon of Sri Lanka in 1400s), it is said that, "ladies applied fragrant sandalwood paste in their bodies prior to participate for the musical contest". 

Lo Veda Sangarawa (another ancient Sinhalese writing by Ven. Vidagama Maithriya Thero) says "having delicious food and applying wonderful sandalwood paste ..."

In addition to that, Great Writings in Eastern Literature such as Buddhist Jathaka stories, Dhamma Pada, Vinaya Pitaka (400 BC) etc mentioned sandalwood trees.

Due to very low germination and slow growth rate, its population is not in the increase at present. In addition to that, illegal felling done at a fast rate due the high value and high demand of sandalwood oil (santalol) cause a rapid decline of sandalwood population in Sri Lanka. Due to this reason, protection of this priceless resource has become a real issue for the villagers in the intermediate zone. permits from the relevant government offices are required for felling and transporting sandalwood in Sri Lanka. Although very tight protection mechanisms are used in addition to the prevailing law, still those trees are harvested ruthlessly by certain groups. They sell those trees at cheaper values to certain "unknown" merchants in the area. The picture below illustrates a desperate attempt of a villager in Welimada, Sri Lanka for protecting his mature sandalwood plant by wrapping its stem using a tin sheet. He says that there would be a noise when this tin sheet is unwrapped prior to cutting the tree.

The most unfortunate thing in illegal sandalwood felling is that, the thieves carry only one to two meter long stem sections and leave the roots and upper stems on the ground. The poor villager not only looses the tree's most valuable area, but also faces problems in selling what left on the ground by the thieves because of the permit issue. The other heart-breaking view is the sacrifice of the immature small trees by thieves. They cut the tree up to the suspected heartwood area and then if there is no typical sandalwood smell, they leave the tree. Due to the low diameter, the tree falls with the very next wind to the ground.

Government has not made a proper attempt to promote sandalwood growing among villager. In fact there are no sandalwood forests of mixed forest owned by the government of Sri Lanka. However, it should be appreciated that the private sector such as a leading forestry investment company, Sadaharitha Plantations Limited came forward to establish sandalwood plantations in large scale as an investment opportunity for the people living in Sri Lanka and overseas.