What value can you put on a tree?

None, apparently, if you are part of the Ministry of Works and Engineering, which seems to regard any tree as an obstacle to be eliminated as quickly and carelessly as possible.

That's a travesty, because trees are much more than a nuisance or annoyance which lies in the way of a sidewalk or commuter. If you don't work for Works, then the value of trees should be readily apparent. They provide the oxygen we breathe, they provide a habitat for birds and other animals, they provide wind breaks and they tie the soil together, preventing erosion.

From a comfort perspective, they provide shade and cool on a hot summer's day and a modicum of shelter on a rainy one.

Trees also provide wood, and when managed properly, they can be cut and milled, while the successor trees are planted to grow and replace them. Some trees are more valuable than others. The pernicious Mexican Pepper and Indian Laurel must be controlled because they run amok otherwise. The stately Poinciana is a beautiful tree and the best source of shade around.

The queen of Bermuda trees is the cedar. It is endemic, it has a beautiful wood and it has evolved to survive and thrive in Bermuda. For most Bermudians, it is the plant that we most closely identify with, much more than the onion or the palmetto. And the fact that ever since the blight of the 1940s it has teetered on the brink of extinction makes it all the more valuable.

Since then, Bermuda's scientists and conservationists have laboured to keep the cedar alive and have struggled to find blight-resistant strains which can be propagated.

This week, a cedar that the Bermuda National Trust rated among the top 20 to survive the blight was cut down on Ord Road to make way for a sidewalk. The sidewalk was built by Works and Engineering at the request of the property owner, and in doing so, the tree's roots were exposed making it unstable.

Works agreed, saying it was the owner's right to cut the tree down after the Works Ministry had made it unstable. What's wrong with this picture?

Would it not have been possible, as National Trust director Amanda Outerbridge said, to work out a way to build the sidewalk so that the tree would be preserved?

To add insult to injury, Government has just endorsed a biodiversity plan that would put plants and animals on an endangered species list. One would assume that the cedar would be on the top of the list. And yet the same Government cut down this ancient tree. Apparently, the biodiversity plan unveiled with backslaps all round at an environmental conference last month - and the full endorsement of the Cabinet - is not worth the paper it is written on.

Aside from the beauty of the tree, and the lack of much vegetation along that stretch of Ord Road, there is another issue at stake.

As scientists learn more and more about how plants and animals are built and develop, trees like this one may finally have the secrets of their survival unlocked so that in time the cedar can be restored to the hills and valleys of Bermuda. But, if the Government continues with this approach, those secrets will be lost forever, and the trees, so entwined with Bermuda's soul, will be lost too.