SANTO DOMINGO.- Dominican Republic’s Environment Minister on Wednesday  affirmed that Haitians are devastating the border region, for which the government’s grave environmental concern is to put a halt to illegal cutting of trees, action he attributes to the neighboring country’s citizens who make charcoal to sell.

Jaime David Fernandez Mirabel said the situation has led to a siphoning of funds which the government originally allocated to preserve and expand the forests, through the program Quisqueya Verde.

The ex Vice President said however that in the rest of the country there’s absolute control over illegal lumbering to make charcoal, after a government program has helped hundreds of thousands of homes to buy cooking gas.

"In the rest of the country there’s absolute control over the cutting of trees to make charcoal, by the implementation of the Bonogás program, through which around 800,000 of the country’s most impoverished homes receive a subsidy to purchase cooking gas, through the Bonogás card,” said Fernandez Mirabal, interviewed on the TV program El Diario.

He warned that as long as the demand for charcoal in the neighboring country persists the Haitians’ depredatory action at the border region will continue, because most homes don’t even have stoves. “Our attention is centered in preserving the border region’s natural resources, where the Haitians take advantage of any opportunity to chop down trees on this side of the border strip.”