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| Ugyenmo’s house in Japong village |
Bamboos dying in large numbers on the hills of Jarey gewog in Lhuentse worry villagers, who depend on the plant for roofing and other domestic purposes. About 150 houses in the gewog with 221 households have bamboo roofing, while others use bamboo to roof animal sheds and make products for domestic use.
“Most houses in the gewog have not changed their roofs over three years,” said a villager, Ugyenmo, 66. Normally, villagers redo their roofing once every two years. “The roof is leaking and my house is rotting but we can’t do anything. There’s no bamboo in the forest and we don’t have money to buy other types of roofing,” said Ugyenmo, who lives with her daughter and three grandchildren. She owns a big two-storied traditional house, but the roof has been he same for the last six years.
Villagers have started penetrating into deeper forests, but say there are not many bamboos around. “Whatever’s available is very far and difficult to transport,” said another villager. “We’ve started scaling the other side of Jarey hill in the hope of finding bamboos to re-roof our houses before monsoon sets in.” Continue reading Bamboo demise leaves Jarey roofs bereft
