How an erroneous assessment of Green Cover is destroying our forests, right under our nose.
India’s definition of forests is being criticized on the grounds that it doesn’t provide an accurate picture of the naturally occurring forest area or the green cover.
And because of this wrong assessment of green cover, there is a large scale deforestation and destruction of forests, while the government claims (and even shows) that the green cover is increasing, apparently.
Definition of Forest
- Prior to 2016, Forest is either defined by dictionary definition or land recorded as a forest on any government record, as per a 1996 Supreme Court order.
- By 2016, Forest had a new definition, as below.
1. Already recorded forest areas.
2. Patches classified as forests under state laws and land classification systems, such as chote jhad ke jungle, bani, oran, civil soyam land etc.
3. Geographical features such as gair mumkin pahar, ravines, nala etc. and even mangroves, alpine meadows and montane bamboo brakes etc.
4A. In states with forest area less than 1/3 of the geographical area, land patches having 10 per cent crown density will be termed forest.
4B. In states with demarcated forest area more than 1/3 of the geographical area, land patches having 40 per cent crown density will be termed forest.
5. Private plantations (upwards of 5 hectares) with more than 70% of natural forest will also be considered a forest.
With these newer definitions and inclusions, there has been an apparent rise in the forest cover, estimated NET increase being 6700 sq. Km (despite clearing of forests for various purposes in these years)
MoEF in his report 'State of Forests' mentioned that the forest cover is actually increasing. How is the Forest Cover increasing? Between 2014 and 2017,
- Around 21000 sq. Km of forest area was cleared for various activities such as industries, mining, hydel projects etc
- There has been an increase in forest cover of about 24000 sq. Km.
This APPARENT increase is because of the NEWLY drafted definition of forest, along with the Survey of India satellite data that identifies commercial crops and plantation too as green cover (may or may not be under the purview of the definition).
What we need to know?
1. Compensatory afforestation is never compensatory. Suppose 100 sq. Km of forest is cleared - it takes away an entire ecosystem of flora and fauna that have been living for hundreds or even thousands of years. How can planting saplings in an equal area be called "compensatory"? Additionally, compensatory afforestation is done close to human habitations, thus not enabling many species to prosper in that area.
2. With the different states of India, adopting the newer definition, more land will fall under the definition of a forest (or under the purview of FCA). That is only an apparent increase.
3. Worrying part is the allocation of land to development projects - roads and linear infra, mining, industries, hydel projects etc, where in natural forests are being axed. Not only is the ecosystem destroyed, but also the contiguity of the forests is lost.
As a matter of fact, we can never know the extent to which we have lost the Forest Cover to date, because of the non-existent definition.
What should be done or opposed ?
Axing/clearing the already notified forests is a big blunder, and this has to stop. 122 Sq. Km of forests each year (since 2014) is being cleared in the name of development. To the already stressed out migration corridors, and non-contiguous forests, we are adding more.
-> Also, read, UN body flags concern on INDIA's definition of FOREST.